Watching the performances of some playwrights, for example, Eugene Ionesco, you can come up against such a phenomenon in the art world as the theater of the absurd. To understand what contributed to the emergence of this trend, you need to turn to the history of the 50s of the last century.
What is the theater of the absurd (drama of the absurd)
In the 1950s, for the first time, productions appeared, the plot of which seemed to the audience absolutely pointless. The main concept of these plays was the alienation of man from the social and physical environment. In addition, during the action on the stage, the actors managed to combine incompatible concepts.
New plays destroyed all the laws of drama and did not recognize any authority. Thus, all cultural traditions were challenged. This new theatrical phenomenon, which to some extent denied the existing political and social system, was the theater of the absurd. This concept was first used by theater critic Martin Esslin only in 1962. But some playwrights did not agree with this term. For example, Eugene Ionesco suggested calling the new phenomenon "theater of ridicule."
History and Sources
The origins of the new trend were several French and one Irish author. The most popular were able to win the viewer Eugene Ionesco and Samuel Becket. Jean Genet and Arthur Adamov also contributed to the development of the genre.
The idea of the theater of the absurdity first came to the head of E. Ionesco. The playwright tried to learn English, using a textbook for independent study. It was then that he drew attention to the fact that many dialogues and remarks in the textbook are completely incoherent. He saw that in ordinary words there is a lot of absurdity that often turns even clever and high-sounding words into completely meaningless.
However, it would not be entirely honest to say that only a few French playwrights were involved in the emergence of the new direction. After all, existentialists spoke of the absurdity of human existence. For the first time, this topic was fully developed by A. Camus, whose influence on creativity was played by F. Kafka and F. Dostoevsky. However, it was E. Ionesco and S. Beckett who designated and brought to the stage the theater of the absurd.
Features of the new theater
As already mentioned, a new direction in theatrical art denied classical drama. Common characteristic features of it were:
- fantastic elements that get along with reality in the play;
- the emergence of mixed genres: tragicomedy, comic melodrama, tragedyfare - which began to supplant the "pure";
- the use in productions of elements that are characteristic of other types of art (choir, pantomime, musical);
- in contrast to the traditional dynamic action on the stage, as it was earlier in classical productions, statics prevail in a new direction;
- One of the main changes that characterizes the theater of the absurd is the speech of the characters of the new productions: it seems that they communicate with themselves, because the partners do not listen and do not respond to each other's remarks, they simply pronounce their monologues into the void.
Types of absurdity
The fact that the new direction in the theater had several founders at once explains the division of absurdity into types:
1. The nihilistic absurdity. These are the works of the famous E. Ionescu and Hildesheimer. Their plays are distinguished by the fact that viewers still fail to understand the subtext of the game throughout the entire performance.
2. The second type of absurdity reflects universal chaos and, as one of its main parts, man. In this vein, the works of S. Becket and A. Adamov were created, which sought to emphasize the lack of harmony in human life.
3. Satirical absurdity. As the name implies, representatives of this direction Durrenmatt, Grass, Frisch and Havel tried to ridicule the absurdity of the modern social system and human aspirations.
Key works of the theater of the absurd
What is the theater of the absurd, the audience learned after the premiere of “The Bald Singer” by E. Ionesco and “Waiting for Godot” by S. Beckett in Paris.
A characteristic feature of the production of “Bald Singer” is that the one that should have been the main character does not appear on the stage. On the stage there are only two married couples whose actions are absolutely static. Their speech is inconsistent and full of cliches, which further reflects the picture of the absurdity of the world. Heroes repeat such incoherent, but absolutely typical remarks again and again. The language, which by its nature is intended to make communication easy, in the play only interferes with it.
In Beckett's play, “Waiting for Godot,” two completely inactive heroes are constantly waiting for a certain Godot. Not only does this character never appear throughout the entire action, besides, no one knows him. It is noteworthy that the name of this unknown hero is associated with the English word God, i.e. "God". Heroes recall incoherent fragments from their lives, besides, they do not leave a feeling of fear and uncertainty, because there is simply no way of action that could protect a person.
Thus, the theater of the absurd proves that the meaning of human existence can only be found in understanding that it does not make sense.