Art & MusicGreek → English
Melodrama
/ˈmɛləˌdrɑːmə/noun
A play or story that works through heightened emotion, sharp moral contrasts and improbable turns.
The Greek roots
μέλος
mélos
song, tune
δρᾶμα
drâma
action, play
Literally: “song-drama”
The story of the word
French mélodrame named a play in which spoken lines ran over background music, the orchestra swelling under the actor's voice. English took the word around 1802, kept the emotional excess and dropped the orchestra. μέλος is the tune rather than the words, the same root that gives melody; δρᾶμα means simply a thing done on stage.
- How it travelled
- Ancient Greek → French → English
- First recorded
- early 19th century
The same roots elsewhere
Other languages reached for exactly the same Greek pieces.
Same family
melodydramadramaticmelisma
In a sentence
The final act tipped into melodrama, with a confession, a storm and a long-lost brother.
She told the story straight, without melodrama.