A concept of dramatic genre and the comedy of a new type : chess, literature, and film / V. Ulea.

Format:

Book

Author/Creator:

Ulea, V.

Contributor:

Gotham Book Mart Collection (University of Pennsylvania)

Language:

English

Subjects (All):

European drama (Comedy)--History and criticism.

European drama (Comedy).

European drama (Tragedy)--History and criticism.

European drama (Tragedy).

Literary form.

Penn Provenance:

Gotham Book Mart (former owner) (Gotham Book Mart Collection copy)

Physical Description:

xvii, 196 pages ; 24 cm

Place of Publication:

Carbondale : Southern Ill. Univ. Press, [2002]

Summary:

A Concept of Dramatic Genre and the Comedy of a New Type: Chess, Literature, and Film approaches dramatic genre from the point of view of the degree of richness and strength of a character's potential. Its main focus is to establish a methodology for analyzing the potential from multidimensional perspectives, using systems thinking. The whole concept is an alternative to the Aristotelian plot-based approach and is applied to an analysis of western and eastern European authors as well as contemporary American film. This innovative study consists of three parts: The first part is mostly theoretical, proposing a new definition of the dramatic as a category linked to general systems phenomena and offering a new classification of dramatic genre. In the second part, Ulea offers a textual analysis of some works based on this new classification. She analyzes comedies, tragedies, and dramas on the same or similar topics in order to reveal what makes them belong to opposite types of dramatic genre. Additionally, she considers the question of fate and chance, with regard to tragedy and comedy, from the point of view of the predispositioning theory. In the third part, Ulea explores an analysis of the comedy of a new type -- CNT. Her emphasis is on the integration of the part and the whole in approaching the protagonist's potential. She introduces the term quasi-strong potential in order to reveal the illusory strength of protagonists of the CNT and to show the technique of CNT's analysis and synthesis. Ulea's research begins with the notion of the comic, traditionally considered synonymous with the laughable, and attempts to approach it as independent from the laughable and laughter. The necessity to do so is dictated by the desire to penetrate the enigmatic nature of Chekhov's comedy. The result is A Concept of Dramatic Genre and the Comedy of a New Type: Chess, Literature, and Film, a completely new approach to potential and systems thinking -- which has never been a focus of dramatic theory before. Such potential is the touchstone of the comic and comedy, their permanent basic characteristic, the heart and axis around which the comedic world spins.

Contents:

Part 1 Dramatic Genre as a General Systems Phenomenon

1. Dramatic Genre: A New Classification 3

2. The Dramatic as an Independent Category: Chess, Economics, and Literature 28

Part 2 Dramedy, Drama, and Comedy: A New Classification

3. Protagonists of the Same Strata and Status in Different Types of Dramatic Genre 51

4. Literary Works of the Same and Analogous Topics 71

5. A Miraculous Turn: Fate, Chance, and Predisposition in Comedy, Dramedy, and Drama 91

Part 3 The Comedy of a New Type: The Integration of the Part and the Whole

6. Chekhov and Balzac as the Pioneers of the CNT 111

7. Quasi-Dramatic Effects in the CNT 133

8. Myth and Symbol in the CNT: The Space of Action and the Implied Space 151

1. Variety of Basic Types 171

2. Mixed Types and Branches 173

3. Text, Context, Subtext, and the Literary Work 175.

Notes:

Includes bibliographical references and index.

Local Notes:

Gotham Book Mart Collection copy has dustjacket retained.

ISBN:

0809324520

OCLC:

51301095