In one sense, the quotation from Hugo von Hofmannsthal's Unterhaltung über den ‘Tasso’ von Goethe that I have chosen as a motto for the beginning of this book can be interpreted as a critical attack on it. For cannot the objection raised by the ‘poet’ in the Unterhaltung, that any attempts to talk about drama in general terms are bound to fail miserably in the face of specific plays by dramatists such as Goethe or Shakespeare, also be levelled against this book, whose title states quite categorically that it is supposed to be a general theory of drama? In its defence, though, it is fair to say that Hofmannsthal was directing his ire not at those who like to discuss drama in more general terms but at those who make unashamedly sweeping statements as to what drama should be. In this sense, then, I do not feel that this objection can apply to the present study because, although my intention has been to establish a systematic general theory, I have tried to avoid falling into the trap of making normative and prescriptive value judgements. Furthermore, my interest has not been in drawing up a comprehensive definition of drama as a whole but in putting together a detailed and sophisticated description of its structures and textualisation processes.