Proměna funkce posla v dramatu

The present paper deals with the messenger character from the perspective of transformation of its function in drama regarding its presence and use in the history of drama where it focuses on messenger figures in Sophocles' Oedipus King and Shakespeare's Antony and Cleopatra, and in the context of contemporary mainstream British drama in the plays Arcadia by Tom Stoppard and Copenhagen by Mychael Frayn. Based on the contrasts between examples from classical and contemporary plays, the study shows that Messenger disappears as an independent character while its functions within dramatic narrative strategies remain preserved as other main dramatic characters take on this function, which had belonged to nameless Messenger figures. It also focuses on formal aspects of messengers' narratives, the 'reportage', and it shows the ways these narratives are incorporated into the drama as a whole.