Fiche de révision : Drama anglais médiéval et Tudor

📋 Plan du Cours

1. units
2. Le drama anglais médiéval
3. Les mystery plays
4. Les morality plays et l’allégorie
5. Les grandes morality plays
6. Les interludes et la transition dramatique
7. John Heywood et la comédie séculière
8. La naissance du théâtre professionnel

📖 1. units

🔑 Notions clés & Définitions

• Drama : Drama is a composition in prose or verse adapted to be acted upon a stage, and the word comes from the Greek dran, meaning “to do” or “to act.”

★ À maîtriser

📌 Drama refers to the written play, including its text, characters, dialogue, plot, and stage directions, whereas theatre refers to the performance of that work before an audience.

Compléments

• The term drama was used in this sense in English from the 16th century.

📖 2. Le drama anglais médiéval

📝 Points essentiels

• Medieval drama could be performed in:
  • inside churches
  • outside churches
  • streets
  • marketplaces
  • towns and cities
  • the countryside

📌 Medieval drama gradually changed from being closely connected to religious ceremonies into a form of public entertainment.

• The three major genres were:
  • mystery plays
  • morality plays
  • interludes

💡 Astuce mémo

Des cérémonies religieuses → un divertissement public dans des lieux variés

📖 3. Les mystery plays

🔑 Notions clés & Définitions

• Mystery plays : medieval religious dramas based mainly on stories from the Bible, presenting episodes from the Creation and the Fall of Man through the life, death, and resurrection of Christ
• Pageant : a movable stage or platform on which actors performed as it moved through or stopped at different locations in a town

★ À maîtriser

• 🔄 Religious drama gradually moved:

  1. from the Church
  2. to the church porch
  3. to streets and marketplaces

• Guilds could provide:

  • money
  • costumes
  • props
  • performers
  • organizational support

• A mystery cycle consisted of many individual plays presenting a large part of Biblical history; the York Mystery Cycle contains 48 plays, often performed during major religious celebrations, particularly Corpus Christi.

Compléments

• The Second Shepherds’ Play, written in the late 15th century and associated with the Wakefield cycle, combines a religious story with a comic subplot in which the dishonest Mak steals a sheep from the shepherds.

💡 Astuce mémo

Church → church porch → streets and marketplaces

📖 4. Les morality plays et l’allégorie

🔑 Notions clés & Définitions

• Morality plays : Morality plays developed mainly during the 15th and early 16th centuries and presented allegorical stories about human behaviour and morality rather than Biblical stories.
• Allegory : In an allegory, a character represents an idea or moral quality while also having a role in the story.

★ À maîtriser

• Morality plays commonly represented virtues, vices, and abstract concepts through characters, and their central conflict was usually a battle between good and evil.

Compléments

• Approximately 60 English morality plays survive, although many more were probably written.

💡 Astuce mémo

Mystery plays = récits bibliques ; morality plays = comportements et concepts personnifiés

📖 5. Les grandes morality plays

★ À maîtriser

• The Castle of Perseverance is generally dated to the early 15th century and contains around 36 characters.

• In Mankind, the central character represents humanity, while Mercy represents good and Mischief represents evil through comic and disruptive behaviour.

• Everyman represents all human beings and is confronted by Death, who tells him to prepare for his final journey.

• In Everyman, the protagonist seeks a companion for his final journey, but Fellowship, Goods, Knowledge, and other companions abandon him before Good Deeds remains with him.

📌 Everyman teaches that worldly possessions and social relationships cannot accompany a person beyond death, whereas Good Deeds ultimately remains; therefore, human beings should live a morally good life.

Compléments

• The surviving manuscript of The Castle of Perseverance contains a stage plan that provides information about medieval theatrical practice.

💡 Astuce mémo

Everyman perd ses compagnons, mais Good Deeds reste avec lui

📖 6. Les interludes et la transition dramatique

🔑 Notions clés & Définitions

• Interludes : Interludes developed mainly during the 15th and 16th centuries as a transition between medieval morality plays and Tudor or Renaissance drama.

📝 Points essentiels

• Interludes were generally:

  • shorter
  • more comic and witty
  • often performed indoors
  • increasingly performed by professional actors
  • less focused on religious subjects

• 🔄 English drama gradually moved from:

  1. Biblical stories
  2. moral and allegorical stories
  3. secular comedy and entertainment

💡 Astuce mémo

Mystery plays → morality plays → interludes

📖 7. John Heywood et la comédie séculière

★ À maîtriser

• John Heywood was the most important writer associated with the English interlude and helped move English drama toward secular comedy.

• Heywood’s dramatic style is characterized by:

  • satire
  • humour
  • wordplay
  • everyday situations
  • comic misunderstandings
  • criticism of human behaviour

Compléments

• John Heywood lived approximately from 1497 to 1580, was active at the court of Henry VIII, and later remained active during the reigns of Edward VI and Mary I.

• The Play of the Weather, written around 1533, brings together characters with different wishes about the weather to create a humorous examination of human desires and complaints.

• The Play Called the Four PP, written around 1543–1544, uses humour, exaggeration, competition, and deception among four characters whose occupations begin with P.

💡 Astuce mémo

S-H-W-E-C : satire, humour, wordplay, everyday situations, comic misunderstandings

📖 8. La naissance du théâtre professionnel

📝 Points essentiels

• 🔄 The development of professional acting involved: groups of trained actors, acting companies connected with aristocratic patrons, companies connected with the royal court

• The emergence of professional theatrical culture eventually led to Elizabethan theatre in the late 16th century.

💡 Astuce mémo

Acteurs formés et mécènes aristocratiques → culture théâtrale professionnelle → théâtre élisabéthain

📊 Tableaux de synthèse

Genres du drama médiéval et Tudor