Definition of Plot
If you've ever seen a movie (and most likely you have), you're already familiar with plot and how it works. The PLOT is the story; or, in other words, what the characters do and what happens to them. It incorporates how and why those things happen, and the consequences of the characters' actions. Depending on a play's emphasis, its plot could be quite simple or very complex. The plot of 'night, Mother, for example, is a simple one: A daughter and her mother debate the daughter's decision to commit suicide. Shakespeare's plays, on the other hand, tend to be built around very complicated story lines: Consider the eternally popular comedy A Midsummer Night's Dream, which takes the audience through a series of mistaken identities and love triangles before resolving the characters' confusions and yearnings. The story might be fast-paced and suspenseful, like Antigone, or slow and introspective, like Death of a Salesman. Plots can usually be classified as comic or tragic, meaning they either build toward a happy or positive ending, like A Raisin in the Sun, or a sorrowful or negative one, like M. Butterfly. (Keep in mind, however, that comedies are not necessarily funny, nor do tragedies always provoke tears.)
Whatever form a plot takes, it generally derives from some form of opposition, or conflict, among characters. A play's central conflict could be a single character's emotional turmoil, a social or political dilemma, or, more commonly, an interpersonal struggle. Playwrights use conflict to establish their characters' motives and to drive the sequence of events in a play. Conflict sets the stage, so to speak, for a play's action. Without some sort of opposition or struggle, an audience isn't likely to care about what happens to the characters.
Most traditional plots can be divided into five main components that take place in sequence. A play normally begins with an exposition that provides background information about the characters and the central conflict, and starts the narrative, or chain of events. It then follows a rising action, or a movement toward the central issue or climax of the plot. A play's climax represents the most significant turning point in the story—a lead character may make an irrevocable decision, for example, or two characters could engage in a physical battle, a secret might be exposed, or a love confessed. The falling action that follows reveals the consequences of the climax and leads toward the plot's dénouement (French for "unknotting") or conclusion, in which any loose ends are tied and the conflict is resolved. (Some critics and scholars classify these components as, respectively, background, development, climax, action, and ending, or "ABCDE.")
Not every plot, of course, follows this pattern. A play might start in the middle of the action (this strategy is called in medias res) and not provide background information until later. It could start with the climax and devote the rest of the narrative to exploring the consequences. It could even start at the end of the story and work its way backward. A play may refuse to resolve the issues it raises. But regardless of the pattern that is followed, an awareness of the five central elements of plot will help you to understand how the actions in a play are related—to one another, to the characters, and to the play's central themes.
comedy: A play that ends on a positive note or has a happy ending; not necessarily a funny play
tragedy: A play that ends on a negative note or has an unhappy ending; not necessarily a tear-jerker
conflict: The basic tension, predicament, or challenge that propels a story's plot
complications: Plot events that plunge the protagonist further into conflict
exposition: An introduction to characters and background information essential to the plot
rising action: The part of a plot in which the drama intensifies, rising toward the climax
climax: The plot's most dramatic and revealing moment, usually the turning point of the story
falling action: The part of the plot that follows the climax, when the drama subsides and the conflict is resolved
dénouement: The conclusion of the play, it often resolves issues and answers any remaining questions
Plot Exercise
INSTRUCTIONS
Read this plot synopsis of Sophocles' classical Greek play Oedipus Rex and answer the questions that follow it.
Oedipus is the king of Thebes. His wife and queen is Jocasta, the widow of the murdered former king Laius. As the play opens - twelve years after Oedipus has been given the crown for rescuing Thebes from the riddling Sphinx - the Thebans implore him to save them from a plague that is destroying the city and killing off its inhabitants. At this moment, Jocasta's brother Creon returns from the oracle of Apollo with news that the pestilence will end if Laius' murderer is identified and exiled. Hoping to find out who killed the former king, Oedipus consults the prophet Tiresias, who reluctantly informs him that Oedipus himself is the murderer.
Oedipus becomes convinced that Tiresias is helping Creon plot to take over the throne, but Jocasta manages to stop her husband and brother from engaging in battle. She tries to calm Oedipus by telling him that seers can be wrong, offering as proof the prophecy that her son would kill his father and sire her children - a fate she believes she prevented by leaving her infant son in the mountains to die. Laius, she informs Oedipus, was killed by robbers on the route to Delphi. Her description of Laius' death makes Oedipus uneasy, because he himself had killed a man on the way to Delphi while he was trying to thwart a prophecy that he would kill his father and marry his mother.
As the coincidence is revealed, a messenger informs Oedipus that his father Polybus has died and that Oedipus has been elected to replace him as king of Corinth. Oedipus replies that he won't return to Corinth until his mother is dead as well, explaining his desire to prevent the fulfillment of the seer's prophecy. In response to this, the messenger tells Oedipus not to worry because Polybus and Merope had found him as an abandoned infant in the mountains and adopted him. To their horror, Oedipus and Jocasta realize that the awful prophecy has been fulfilled as the very result of their efforts to prevent it. Jocasta hangs herself. Oedipus gouges out his eyes and exiles himself from Thebes so that the plague on its people may be stopped.
What is the central conflict that drives the plot of Oedipus Rex?
Use the pull-down menus to select the stage of plot development that corresponds to each of the following moments in the story of Oedipus:
Oedipus is the king of Thebes. His wife and queen is Jocasta, the widow of the murdered former king Laius.
Hoping to find out who killed the former king, Oedipus consults the prophet Tiresias, who reluctantly informs him that Oedipus himself is the murderer.
Jocasta tries to calm Oedipus by telling him that seers can be wrong, offering as proof the prophecy that her son would kill his father and sire her children—a fate she believes she prevented by leaving her infant son in the mountains to die. Laius, she informs Oedipus, was killed by robbers on the route to Delphi.
The messenger tells Oedipus not to worry because Polybus and Merope had found him as an abandoned infant in the mountains and adopted him.
Oedipus gouges out his eyes and exiles himself from Thebes so that the plague on its people may be stopped.
Explain your choices.