# Monologue

Monologues share much in common with several other literarydevices including soliloquies, apostrophes, and aside. There are, however, distinctions between each of these devices. In theatre, a monologue is presented by a single character, most often to express their mental thoughts aloud, though sometimes also to directly address another character or the audience.

## Quotes

* Shakespeare is absolutely big in Africa. I guess he's big everywhere. Growing up, Shakespeare was the thing. You'd learn monologues and you'd recite them. And just like hip-hop, it made you feel like you knew how to speak English really well. You had a mastery of the English language to some extent.
** Ishmael Beah, in Transcript - Ishmael Beah Was Never Far Away, Listening Comprehension, Cappelen Damm
* I am the kind of person that wants to get up in front of crowds of strangers and perform monologues. To each their own.
** Stephanie Beatriz, in Stephanie Beatriz having big year with 'Brooklyn Nine-Nine,' 'Short Term 12', AXS Entertainment, 23 September 2013
* Monologue, in literature and drama, is an extended speech by one person. The term has several closely related meanings. A dramatic monologue is any speech of some duration addressed by a character to a second person. A soliloquy is a type of monologue in which a character directly addresses an audience or speaks his thoughts aloud while alone or while the other actors keep silent. In fictional literature, an interior monologue is a type of monologue that exhibits the thoughts, feelings, and associations passing through a character’s mind.
** The Editors of The Encyclopædia Britannica, in monologue, 8 February 2013
* A conversation is a dialogue, not a monologue. That's why there are so few good conversations: due to scarcity, two intelligent talkers seldom meet.
** Truman Capote, in Ron A. Carucci Leadership Divided: What Emerging Leaders Need and What You Might Be Missing, John Wiley & Sons, 30 September 2006
* 'Nashville' songs and country music have always been about story telling and about the heart and confessionals. They're monologues.
** Chip Esten, in Liane Bonin Starr Interview: Charles Esten of "Nashville" says why he's fighting for Deacon's sobriety, HITFIX , 6 February 2013
* A monologue can never be the whole story of a particular drama. It is always just one character's point of view at an isolated moment in the action...Perhaps the only and best bit of direction to leave you with when doing a monologue is to feel the need to speak, know what you are speaking about and to whom, and the words will connect with what you have to say.
** Micheal Erley, Philippa Keil The Contemporary Monologue: Women:, Routledge, 13 May 2013, p. Notes to the Actor
* ...a monologue, which is a lengthy speech. Unlike a soliloquy, however, a monologue is addressed to other characters, not to the audience.
** Language Study Guide, in The Tragedy of Romeo and Juliet by William Shakespeare Figurative Language Study Guide
* ...to be a dramatic monologue a poem must have a speaker and an implied auditor, and that the reader often perceives a gap between what that speaker says and what he or she actually reveals.
** George P. Landow, in Dramatic Monologue: An Introduction, Victorian web, 10 March 2003
* Most conversations are simply monologues delivered in the presence of a witness.
** Margaret Millar, in Linda Gross Cheliotes, Marceta Fleming Reilly Opening the Door to Coaching Conversations, SAGE, 16 May 2012, p. 75
* Monologue and dialogue are two basic aspects of the semantic organization of an utterance and at the same time two mutually opposed forms of a linguistic structure in the functional sense; therefore, linguistics often speaks about monoligic and diologic speech.
** Jan Mukarovský, in O jazyce básnickém, John Benjamins Publishing, 1 January 1976
* The obvious mechanical convenience of monologues in general, quite apart from link Monologues, is their availability in filling time. On the whole the link monologue is less widely employed for this purpose than the entrance monologues.
** Henry W. Prescott, in Dialogues in Roman Comedy, Chicago Journals.
* In role based stories Monologues are role based stories addressed to imaginary and/or actual listneres (on stage and in the audience)
** Monica Prendergast, Juliana Saxton, in Applied Drama: A Facilitator's Handbook for Working in Community, Intellect Books, 2013, p. 155
* Monologues, in which one person does all the talking, are longer speeches than participants have expressed so far. This does not mean that a monologue expresses only one point of view, its interest lies in the variety of perspectives that the speaker may present as part of the argument. Monologues are valuable components in the devising process and can serve as introduction, reflections and/or as links between scenes.
** Monica Prendergast, Juliana Saxton, in "Applied Drama: A Facilitator's Handbook for Working in Community", p. 156
* Although monologues are solo-voiced, in their theatrical representation there is a need for a more dialogical reality , with a real or imaginary “listener” to whom monologue is directed. In this kind of work, monologue is not the product of one person alone, but is processed and shaped within and by the group, which is a political act in itself.
** Monica Prendergast, Juliana Saxton, in "Applied Drama: A Facilitator's Handbook for Working in Community", p. 156
* A monologue is a speech made by a character to other characters, sometimes to a crowd. It is not a dialogue, where two or more people are in conversation with each other. Shakespeare’s plays are full of monologues. Among the most famous are Henry V’s ‘Once more unto the breach, dear friends, once more’ speech, where the king is leading his troops into battle, and Marc Antony’s ‘Friends, Romans and countrymen, lend me your ears’ speech in Julius Caesar, where Antony is addressing the Roman crowd after the assassination of Caesar.
** No Sweat Shakespeare, In Definition of Monologues & Soliloquies In Shakespeare, NoSweatShakespeare!
* Mercutio. O, then I see Queen Mab hat been with you. She is the fairies’ midwife, and she comes In shape no bigger than an agate stone On the forefinger of an alderman. Drawn with a team of little atomies, Over men’s noses as they lie asleep: Her wagon spokes made of long spinners’ legs, The cover, of the wings of grasshoppers: Her traces, of the smallest spider web; Her collars, of the moonshine’s wat’ry beam; Her whip, of cricket’s bone; the lash, of film; Her wagoner, a small gray-coated gnat. Not half so big as a round little worm Pricked from the lazy finger of a maid; Her chariot is an empty hazelnut…
** William Shakespeare, Monologue in Romeo and Juliet, Act I, Scene iv: The famous “I dreamt a dream” in “The Tragedy of Romeo and Juliet by William Shakespeare Figurative Language Study Guide”
* PRINCE. Rebellious subject, enemies to peace, Profaners of this neighbor-stained steel—, Will they not hear? What, ho! You men, you beasts, , That quench the fire of your pernicious rage, With purple fountains issuing from your veins! . . .
** William Shakespeare, Monologue in Macbeth’s Monologue after he hears that Lady Mackbeth has killed herself, in “The Tragedy of Romeo and Juliet by William Shakespeare Figurative Language Study Guide”
* I've written a screenplay that is a series of monologues and songs; they form this sort of human tapestry across time and place. The form is strange, but I find it really fascinating.
** Patrick Wang, in Meet the 2012 Best First Feature Spirit Award Nominees #5: Patrick Wang, 'In The Family', 22 February 2012
* There is no such thing as conversation. It is an illusion. There are intersecting monologues, that is all.
** Rebecca West, in Stephen Miller Conversation: A History of a Declining Art, Yale University Press, 2007, p. 10