Unities:
The three rules underlying a dramatic structure. A play follows certain principles about time, place and action which are known as the unity of time, unity of place and unity of action respectively. The
unity of time, according to Aristotle, is the duration of a play which should be limited within a "single revolution of the sun" or twenty four hours. The unity of place means the closeness of the places at which the play takes place. Aristotle suggested that the scenes of a tragedy should be confined to the premises of the palace or to a single small town. It means that a play should not have one scene in London, another in Dhaka and still another in Paris. It should not change its scenes from place to place. The unity of action means the logically connected incidents of a play. Aristotle said that the incidents of a play should be connected with each other in such a way that nothing could be taken out of it ,without harming its wholeness. English dramatists maintained the unity of action but many of them violated the other two unities.
Wit:
A brief, and brilliant expression intended to produce surprise- and pleasure. In Hamlet, Shakespeare says: "Brevity is the soul of wit." Pope defines it in An Essay on Criticism as:
"True wit is Nature to advantage dressed,
What oft was thought, but ne'er so well expressed.'
Examples:
"No, some of it is for my child's father."
It is Rosalind's reply to Celia's enquiry about Rosalind's grave mood in Shakespeare's As You Like It (Act I, Scene III).
Rosalind has already fallen in love at the first sight of Orlando but she does not want to talk about it openly. So, she gives a witty answer suggesting that she is unhappy for her would-be husband.
Here is another example 'from the same comedy:
No, no Orlando; Men are April when they woo, December when they wed. Maids are May when they are maids, but the sky changes when they are wives," (Act IV, Scene I)
Donne used witty expressions very efficiently. Here is an example from his poem, "The Sun Rising":
Thy beams, so reverend and strong Why shouldst thou think?
I could eclipse and cloud them with a wink,
The wit in the last line brilliantly suggests that the sun boasts of its power for nothing because as soon as one closes one's eyelids sunlight cannot hurt one's eyes.
Congreve has profusely used wit in The Way of the World. Two examples from Act II of the comedy are quoted below:
"...one's cruelty is one's power, and when one parts with one's cruelty, one parts with one's power;"
"...for beauty is the lover's gift; 'tis he bestows your charms—your glass is all cheat."
The characteristic features of wit are brevity, ingenuity, amusement and quickness in effect. In most cases, other figures of speech, especially metaphor, pun and conceit, are used in it to create the desired effect.
Wit is often confused with humour. In fact, it is very difficult to distinguish one from the other. However, wit is something like the flash of lightning, but humour is more like the pleasant sunlight. Wit is malicious and attacking, but humour is compassionate and kind. Wit is intellectual but humour is related to feeling.
Wit has another meaning. In the Neoclassical period writers were called wits.
Zeugma:
A single word (usually a verb or an adjective) that governs or modifies two other words when it is appropriate to one of them. In the sentence, "His boat and his dreams sank", the verb "sank" governs both "boat" and "dreams". "Dreams" is not appropriate to the verb "sank", the way "boat" is appropriate to it. "Shattered" would have been an appropriate verb for "dreams". However, the use of zeugma in an expression makes it interesting though grammatically it is confusing. "His boat sank and his dreams shattered", though grammatically correct, is not as interesting as "His boat and his dreams sank".
Look at the following lines:
Whether the nymph shall break Diana's law,
Or some frail china jar receive a flaw,
Or stain her honour or her new brocade,
Forget her prayers, or miss the masquerade,
Or lose her heart, or necklace, at a ball;
(Pope: The Rape of the Lock)
The verb, stain grammatically controls both "honour" and "brocade" which are different in nature. Similarly, lose controls "heart" and "necklace" which are different in nature.
