All the world’s a stage and all the men and women merely players. Shakespeare has long ago resolved this question about the relation between life and drama. Drama has laid the foundation for the evolution of other genres of Literature like the novel or the short story.
In the days before the invention of printing, drama was the chief source of entertainment and had an extraordinary importance. The world’s greatest works of Literature in many languages have been dramas.
The presentation of tension and the resolution or irresolution of conflict is the main theme in any dramatic enactment. Theoretically speaking it is called ‘rising tension, crisis and falling tension.’ Even in a play like Waiting for Godot from the ‘Theater of the absurd’, the tension is evident. In the classical Greek tragedies the resolution of conflict had a purpose of purging the emotion of the audience (catharsis).
Drama is the representation of conflict. In the dramatic arena it is an enactment. In the medium of the novel or a short story, drama is the conflict and struggle between the characters or in the internal psyche of the character itself. Great novels are all about internal drama; Anna Karenina, Nana, Madame Bovary, Lolita, The Rainbow, The Mill on the Floss, Jude the Obscure, The Sound and the Fury, Crime and Punishment, Metamorphosis, The English Teacher, The Invisible Man, Soul Mountain and The Serpent and the rope are a few examples.