ABSTRACT

In the previous chapter I was exploring the question of what makes a story. A story happens when a routine is broken; stories move quickly towards the disruptive event. Do plays follow this pattern? I went on to talk about characters, but again, do playwrights create characters in the same way as writers of stories? At the end of the chapter I described a scene where a stranger arrives and the writer has no knowledge of what will happen. If you decided to write this scene as the opening of a play, would you be asking: What does this stranger look like? Whose eyes are we allowed to see through? Who is the narrator? At least the first problem is easily solved; the audience will see a live and visible actor. The character will be a creation of the actor and the director, as well as of the writer. In answer to the second question, the characters look at each other, and the audience looks at them both. Both characters are equal before the audience. In answer to the third question, unless there is a third member of the cast called ‘The Narrator’ present, there will be no narrator at all; the audience will be trying to make oat the story from what they see happening on the stage. Nobody knows the story – not the characters, not the audience, because it hasn’t happened yet. It is actually taking place before our eyes.