The medievalist E.-R. Curtious introduced the term "topos" in the literature and history of literature, defining it as a fundamental theme or idea that has taken on a conventional character, is consistently repeated in a nearly stereotypical manner in the development of literary genres, and has acquired a certain, almost immutable functionality (e.g., the locus amoenus, the idyllic landscape in bucolic poetry and pastoral drama).

The tradition of European culture consists of a series or a network of "commonplaces" that are not limited to the invented world of literature but also exist in social reality, in existing institutions and everyday practices, in behaviors and festive events (e.g., the mundus reversus, the inverted world of carnival).

Such stable themes are observed with variations both within a period and within a literary genre (e.g., the masked unknown knight, victorious in the jousting tournament, wins the hand of the princess in chivalric romance, the roman chevaleresque).

In comedy until the Enlightenment, there is the ridiculous old man in love; in classicist tragedy until the 19th century, love sacrificed for duty (or friendship); in post-war Greek drama, the memories from the Civil War, etc.

Such stable thematic networks are largely the foundation of comparative studies when examining literary compositions in light of common elements shared by individual works, but also literary history when linking the sequence of phenomena over time and weaving the thread of developments with such thematic constants, which sometimes show a remarkable resilience throughout the course of time (e.g., the marvelous heroes from medieval heroic poetry to contemporary science fiction films).

In contrast, "modes" initially refer to rhetorical figures in ancient rhetoric that deviate in their usage from the conventional rules of application; they are thus specific stylistic devices, such as metaphor, metonymy, synecdoche, allegory, etc., which not only enrich discourse but are also fundamental expressive strategies of poetics in general.

In the dramatic genre, modes concern the techniques of dramaturgy, those specific strategies of skillful presentation of the plot that create suspense, which relate to dramatic economy, character definition [...], forms of dialogue, flow of information, tricks of stage communication [...], rhythm of utterances, escalation of finales, etc.

Here too, it is observed that each era and each dramatic genre possesses a conventional arsenal of almost stable and unchanging "modes" in form and technique, [...].

Thus, topoi and modes together constitute the basic building blocks of a theatrical work concerning content and form, and simultaneously they are the fundamental research and interpretative fields where the analytical tools of comparative examination and the formation of a "norm" from aesthetic specifications (in a period, in a genre, in a playwright) develop in a homogeneous environment and lead to sound conclusions.

[Excerpt from the text of the preface]