Theatre of the Absurd

Having adopted Sartre’s existentialism as the philosophical basis for his approach while creating his masterpieces, Beckett has become the founder of the Absurd Drama in British Literature. When his plays were first performed, people who were accustomed to the traditional theatre were hostile to his drama. However, particularly after World War II, their losses and fears have made them feel close to Beckett’s…

Every major war is depicted in a painting. Famous decisions are dramatized in plays. The tales of influential people are spelled out in books. The world and its happenings are inevitably reflected within the art of society, and real life events do inspire the art, and thus the culture. As such, it only makes sense that the opposite is true. Human beings in the modern era draw their inspirations for topics ranging from etiquette to fashion from films, shows, novels, and other pieces of the…

definition as late as 1848, by W. K. Kelly (OED). As part of the literary and theatrical genre, burlesque was made to relate to the “intentionally ridiculous” in that it imitated several styles and combined imitations of certain authors and artists with absurd descriptions. In this sense, the term was often used interchangeably with pastiche and parody (Wikipedia). “Burlesque depended on the reader's or listener's knowledge of the subject to make its intended effect, and a high degree of…

the performance façade. I am highly interested in exploring this concept, as most theatre performances I have seen are a maximum length of 3 hours, and do not show the…

“Next Day. Same Time. Same Place.” Thus, with an assertion of uniformity, begins the second act of the play, titled En Attendant Godot, in English, Waiting for Godot: a Tragicomedy in Two Acts. The play was written by the French dramatist Samuel Beckett and was first performed 1953. One of it’s defining characteristics is it’s complete lack of plot, so much so that the second act of the play is almost an exact replication of the first, wrought with repetitions in the dialogue and stage…

population is more likely to have a stroke, heart disease, high blood pressure, and more. The government of the U.S. should be able to regulate the kind of foods and the amount of food that the people can consume. It is absurd how much caffeine and sugary drinks that schools, movie theatres, and gas stations offer to students and adults. At gas stations like 7/11 and Circle K they offer many sizes of drinks,…

The rising of the Theatre of the Absurd in Europe is mainly a theatrical expression of existing dilemmas of post-war Europe while American didn’t experience such spiritual crisis directly caused by war. With American’s economy growing into an unprecedented prosperity，it became the superpower thus made marvelous achievements in military, technology, outer space and in other fields. The expansion of the middle class as well as the increasing of the income has reached the peak and it seemed that…

Imagine going to college to become a Dentist, you sign up for your classes and not only do yo have to take two more years of basic general education classes; You also have to take the classes that don't pertain to your future career at all, like a theatre or music class. Students shouldn't have to cover the same information that they covered in their previous years of school. “Some classes may be beneficial to some, but they mostly just rehash concepts and skills that the majority of students…

became more vibrant and eccentric. Movie plots were absurd. The music of the decade expressed a new need for material goods and the theatre was excessive and expensive. One might say that the American decade that was the 1980s was a nightmare of self -indulgence. When…

In Samuel Beckett’s play Krapp’s Last Tape, an older man celebrates his sixty-ninth birthday in his office, but listens to past recordings of himself from thirty years ago. Beckett emphasizes eloquently described movements and symbolism of everyday objects to reveal how resolutions from the past tends to turn into hypocrisy in the future. Beckett uses the movements of Krapp to describe the tiredness and resentment that he has for himself, yet they are broken promises he commits. He…