The dramatic
monologue has many advantages for a writer. The form allows for a distance
between the author and the speaker. In a dramatic monologue, the person using the "I" is by definition not the author. Why should that matter? With distance, the burden of self-disclosure is lifted. By its nature, the dramatic monologue
tends to preclude self-pity or gut-wrenching confession, no matter how intimate
the subject. Interestingly, the distance between the author and the
speaker sometimes allows for a more
personal revelation, since the writer does not have to claim the material as
autobiographical. Sometimes we are most truly ourselves when we are wearing masks.
By standing in the shoes of a character different from ourselves, we are able to show the unique ability of writing to empathize with another person. Film and theater, for instance, can only show a person from outside. In a dramatic monologue, a writer has the ability to actually understand the thoughts of another human being.
By standing in the shoes of a character different from ourselves, we are able to show the unique ability of writing to empathize with another person. Film and theater, for instance, can only show a person from outside. In a dramatic monologue, a writer has the ability to actually understand the thoughts of another human being.
The disadvantages
of the dramatic monologue include the fact that the reader is sometimes not
sure at any given moment if the content is real or fictional. The reader might not be certain whether to trust the content. so the impact may be lessened. The
authenticity of autobiography is also missing. A writer may use a persona as a
mask, and hide or lose awareness of his or her real thoughts and/or emotions.
For these reasons,
the dramatic monologue fell out of favor for many years. This change of
aesthetics began with Anna Akhmatova and the Acmeist poets in Russia in the
early twentieth century, starting with Akhmatova’s first book,
Evening, published in 1912.
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| Frontispiece of Akhmatova's first book, Evening |
Akhmatova wrote, “I’m somewhat anti-Browning. He always spoke in
another character, for another character. I don’t let anybody else speak a word
(in my poetry, it goes without saying). I speak myself and for myself
everything that is possible and that is not.” Akhmatova says she is “anti-Browning,” because Robert Browning was the acknowledged master of the dramatic monologue in poems such as “My Last Duchess” and “Andrea del Sarto.”
Akhmatova's viewpoint was echoed by Nadezhda Mandelstam, wife of the poet Osip Mandelstam, and an important chronicler of this generation of Russian writers: “In poetry, every word is a confession, every finished work is part of the poet’s autobiography…”
Akhmatova's viewpoint was echoed by Nadezhda Mandelstam, wife of the poet Osip Mandelstam, and an important chronicler of this generation of Russian writers: “In poetry, every word is a confession, every finished work is part of the poet’s autobiography…”
The eclipse of
the dramatic monologue continued during the decades of confessional poetry that
began in the 1950s with the writing of U.S. poets such as Allen Ginsberg, Robert
Lowell, Sylvia Plath, and Anne Sexton. Identity politics of the late 1980s and
the decades that followed also made dramatic monologues somewhat suspect, especially when
the author and the speaker of the monologue were not from the same background. If the speaker and the author were not of the same origin, many readers felt that the author was attempting to speak for or appropriate the material of another group.
In the last decade
or two, the dramatic monologue has made something of a comeback. Poets such as Cornelius Eady, Julie Sheehan, and Robert Thomas have reclaimed the form. The pendulum
has swung back, now that identity politics has made many vital points, and
confessional poetry has explored in depth a range of topics approached by authors testifying from a standpoint very close
to their own. Dramatic monologues are now making a comeback.
Remember when you write a dramatic monologue that it’s a form meant to be spoken aloud. Read your drafts out loud to make sure they sound like a character is speaking in their own, individual voice, telling their story. That voice can and should be very different from your own.
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Zack’s memoir about his writer dad, Hugging My Father’s Ghost
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