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dramatist

dramatist

4 5.2
A person who writes plays for the theatre
  • noun
  • /ˈdræməˌtɪst/
translation icon : dramaturgo
  • I think he's acknowledged as one of the greatest dramatists ever.
  • novelists and dramatists
  • dramatist and actor
  • Iraqi dramatist

So the craft of the dramatist is ancient.

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Examples

  • Mr. Lindsay-Abaire received a Heilpern Award as the Most Promising Dramatist of 1999.

    Fiction book (2000)
  • Oona O'Neill was the daughter of Eugene O'Neill, still America's only Nobel Prize-winning dramatist.

  • So the craft of the dramatist is ancient.

  • I'm gonna give half the money to the New Dramatists' League.

  • Berto Brecht, a German dramatist, wrote that there are many elements to a campaign.

  • For Szondi, the work of the Swedish dramatist continued to occupy a pivotal position in Western literature.

    Academic text (1997)
  • Through the characters' dialogue, the dramatist seems compelled to explain this interaction of oral and literate worlds.

    Academic text (1992)
  • No wonder that al-Ani earned the reputation, rightly deserved, of being Iraq's premier dramatist and actor.

    Academic text (1997)
  • The celebrated dramatist wrote a powerful play about social injustice.

  • Many young actors aspire to work with a renowned dramatist like Tennessee Williams.

Synonyms

writer
vsdramatist
1.0

A person who creates books, articles, or stories

specializes only in creating dramatic works for the theatre
playwright
vsdramatist
79 5.3

A person who writes plays for the theatre

has identical meaning but is a more formal alternative
scriptwriter
vsdramatist
5 4.0

A person who makes scripts for plays, films, or TV shows

focuses only on writing for theatre rather than other media
scriptor
vsdramatist
8.4

A person who writes scripts for plays or films

limits writing to theatre not to broader broadcast media

How Established

dramatist
4 5.2
playwright
79 5.3

Surface Forms

dramatist singular
dramatists plural

Morphology

dramatist = drama (transparent) = drama + ist

The combination of 'drama' and the productive agentive suffix '-ist' clearly yields 'a person associated with drama', typically a playwright, which learners can derive from known parts.

Etymology

The word dramatist comes from drama, a Greek word meaning 'action' or 'play', and the ending -ist, which means 'a person who does something', like in artist. So a dramatist is someone who writes or creates plays.