Le roi s’amuse: Drama and Melodrama

Abstract

For at least three centuries, ‘melodrama’ has asserted itself as one of the predominant aesthetic categories in literature, theatre, cinema, the vast field of music, etc. It brings with it an easily recognised structure which develops through pairs: misrecognition – agnition; disguise – unmasking; kidnap – recovery; pursuit – revelation; betrayal – punishment, forgiveness; damnation – repentance; pleasure – penitence; damage – revenge; seduction – conquest.