Dramatic Writing

DRAMATIC WRITING COURSE -Study Dramatic Writing by Distance Education

" I have never found the staff at any other learning institution as supportive as the staff at ACS. This gives one a lot of peace of mind and confidence to go on - at every squeak from my side, you guys have always been there, immediately to sort me out. The feedback on my lessons has always been really good and meaningful and an important source of my learning. Thanks!..."
- Student with ACS

• Learn to write drama, and stimulate the readers emotions
• Learn more about the mechanics of writing
• Develop your capacity to communicate more clearly and effectively
• Explore opportunities to turn your passion into a rewarding job
  

What is Dramatic Writing?

Drama is the term usually used to describe a specific type of fiction that is represented via performance. It comes from the Greek word for action. So although theatrical drama is intended to be performed by actors for an audience, dramas are also written to be read.

Do you have story ideas but don't know where to start?  Do you want to create plots that are engaging and interesting to read?  Do you want the opportunity to have your work published in the student newsletter?  Then this is the course for you.

Lesson Structure

There are 8 lessons in this course:

1. Introduction
   • Motivation
   • Typing Time
   • Types of Writing : Reflection, Exposition, Description, Explanation, Argument
   • Making Decisions about what to Write
   • Know your stuff
   • The concept
   • Synopsis
   • Keeping a Notebook
   • Process of Story Development
   • Planning a Story
   • Developing your Voice
   • Useful terms
2. Characters
   • Developing the characters
   • Building Characters
   • Main Characters
   • Minor Characters
3. Theme & Genre
   • Developing a Theme
   • Universal Themes
   • Sub Themes
   • Creating Conflict
   • Names
4. Plot Development
   • First Decisions
   • Ambience
   • The End of a Story
   • Types of Dramatic Story: Memoirs, Biographies, Reflective Stories, Historical etc
5. Weaving a Story
   • Techniques: Action, Emotion, Mirror; Parallel lives, Palm Cards
   • Writers Block
   • Developing a Story Line
   • Things to Avoid
   • Different Approaches: Dialectic, Transition
   • How a Character Affects a Plot
   • How Plot Affects Genre
   • Goals
   • Consequences
   • Motive
   • Flashbacks and Flashforwards
6. Writing a Dramatic Short Story
   • Main Character and Antagonist
   • Creating a Sense of Place
   • Counting Out Your Story
   • Short Stories
7. Developing Sub Plots
   • Method
   • Plants
   • Activity
8. Writing a Chapters for a Dramatic Work (Novel or Play)
   • Getting Published
   • Writing Resources
   • Writing as a Business
   • Vanity Publishing
   • Dealing with Publishers
   • Creating a Chapter or Segment of a larger work

Each lesson culminates in an assignment which is submitted to the school, marked by the school's tutors and returned to you with any relevant suggestions, comments, and if necessary, extra reading.

Aims

• Define and develop an understanding of dramatic writing.
• Develop methods of developing characters in dramatic writing.
• Define different genres and develop themes for dramatic writing.
• Develop techniques for developing your plot.
• Describe techniques for weaving a story.
• Develop a short story using dramatic writing.
• Develop a chapter of dramatic writing.
• Determine how to develop sub plots.

What Type of Writing are You Interested in?

There are many different types of writing – short stories, poems, novels, screen plays etc. Dramatic writing can fall into all of these. A short story usually takes place over a shorter period of time. It is often set in just one setting/scene, and the characters may be shown with broader strokes – there is not as much time to analyse characters as there is with novel writing.

A novel, however, allows more space to describe characters and scenes. There may be more than one scene and more than one plot. The plots may be multilayered.

Writing comes in many guises, all of which can be creatively employed and manipulated by the writer, regardless of the form (novel, poetry, travel guide etc) in which she or he is writing.

Developing a Plot

A good plot is usually based on one or two ideas that are very simple. As we said in the first lesson your idea does not have to be original or earth shattering, it just has to be a new take on an old idea.

Think for a moment about vampires. How many stories do you know about vampires? We can look at the old ‘Hammer’ horror films, the original Dracula, the new Twilight saga, Buffy the Vampire Slayer, The Lost Boys…. the list is endless, these are only a few. You may not be an expert on vampires, but if you are aware of these films and books, you will know that all show a slightly different side of vampires. They are all based on the same idea -- that vampires are bloodsuckers, who feast on humans. Of course that is not enough to make a story interesting. Each of these stories is different. For example, The Lost Boys is a story of a young man who nearly becomes a vampire when feeling lost and disillusioned after moving to a new town. The story is about his struggle to not become a vampire and to save his family. So the ‘what if’ for this story is – ‘what if you move to a new town overtaken by vampires’? Buffy The Vampire Slayer is another vampire story that looks at teenage girl who is destined to fight vampires. She is the only one in the world at one point who has this destiny, however, she falls in love with a vampire. The Twilight saga follows a similar theme, a young girl falls in love with a vampire, but this vampire does not believe in taking human life.

It is about vampires, but this serves as an example to how we start off with a simple idea and then move on in our own way, developing our own plots and subplots. As we said earlier, none of these ideas are original but it is how they are written and how the story develops that is important.

So before you go on to develop your plot, which we will look at later, you need to decide on your theme.

Where do you get a theme from? We have already discussed this question in an earlier lesson -- where do we get a concept from? Again this is entirely up to you. There are ideas everywhere around you. On your bookshelf, in your life, in your head, in the conversation you overhear at the supermarket counter, in a sentence you heard, on your TV, in your family's life, everywhere around you.

Want to learn more?   Enrol and start learning today.