Drama is based on the Mistake. I think someone is my friend when he really is my enemy, that I am free to marry a woman when in fact she is my mother, that this person is a chambermaid when it is a young nobleman in disguise, that this well-dressed young man is rich when he is really a penniless adventurer, or that if I do this such and such a result will follow when in fact it results in something very different. All good drama has two movements, first the making of the mistake, then the discovery that it was a mistake. W.h. Auden
About This Quote

For me, drama is based on the Mistake. "Mistake" is a word that shows up over and over again in books. The first example I can think of is this passage from Pride and Prejudice: “Oh! Mr. Darcy -- I am so sorry! What does Mr.

Darcy mean by coming to Longbourn?” “I mean that I have been deceived,” said he drily, “and that you are not the person you pretend to be.” How could Mr. Darcy have known that Elizabeth Bennet was not the person she pretended to be? This is clearly an example of mistake-based drama. Making a mistake enables us to see situations more clearly, something we cannot do if we are not mistaken.

That is why our lives are made of mistakes -- they give us a better view of what is going on around us, enabling us to grow and learn through the mistakes we make during our lives.

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