morality play

noun

1. an allegorical form of the drama current from the 14th to 16th centuries and employing such personified abstractions as Virtue, Vice, Greed, Gluttony, etc.

morality play

noun

1. a type of drama written between the 14th and 16th centuries concerned with the conflict between personified virtues and vices

Word History and Origins

Origin of morality play¹

First recorded in 1925–30

Example Sentences

Either way, four complex decades were reduced to a morality play.

From Freakonomics

This is an ugly story of fragile democracy and brute force, but it is not a simple morality play.

From Time

“The McMartin case began as a morality play about the failure to protect children,” he writes.

From The Daily Beast

It ended as a morality play about the failure to protect civil liberties…[and] the complete negation of the evidence of abuse.

From The Daily Beast

This anti-moralistic political drama is a morality play on the value of political thought, and the importance of doing it well.

From The Daily Beast

It is truly the catalyst for the final act of our morality play.

From The Daily Beast

The log line seemed to telegraph a saccharine morality play on the dangers of vices and excess.

From The Daily Beast

Another form of the medieval drama, the Morality Play, had its origin in the 15th century,—or else very late in the 14th.

From Project Gutenberg

After the pageant came the May pole dancers and the wandering musicians, the Morality Play and the rustic dances.

From Project Gutenberg

It is a curious reproduction, with a slight difference in cast, of the morality play of an earlier time.

From Project Gutenberg

Another little drama of Mr. O'Riordan, "Time," is almost a morality play.

From Project Gutenberg

In the main, he suggests abstract intellect performing in a morality play, exhibiting no emotion but intellectual pride.

From Project Gutenberg