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Burn That Butter!
Absurdity is the condition or state in which human beings exist in a meaningless, irrational universe wherein people's lives have no purpose or meaning. An alternative reaction against drawing-room naturalism came from the Theatre of the Absurd. Whereas traditional theatre attempts to create a photographic representation of life as we see it, the Theatre of the Absurd aims to create a ritual-like, mythological, archetypal, allegorical vision, closely related to the world of dreams. The focal point of these dreams is often man's fundamental bewilderment and confusion, stemming from the fact that he has no answers to the basic existential questions: why we are alive, why we have to die, why there is injustice and suffering.
existentialism and the Theatre of the Absurd
Modern man must descend the spiral of his own absurdity to the lowest point; only then can he look beyond it. It is obviously impossible to get around it, jump over it, or simply avoid it. --Václav Havel |
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The innovative dramatic movement known as the theater of the absurd, which developed in Paris during the 1950s, took its name from Albert Camus' existentialist description of the dilemma of modern humanity. Considering humans to be strangers in a meaningless universe, he assessed their situation as absurd, or essentially pointless. Absurdist playwrights, led by Samuel Beckett, Eugène Ionesco, and Jean Genet, embraced this vision and sought to portray the grim ridiculousness of human life using a dramatic style that subverted theatrical convention. Characterized by fantasy sequences, disjointed dialogue, and illogical or nearly nonexistent plots, their plays are concerned primarily with presenting a situation that illustrates the fundamental helplessness of humanity. Absurdist drama is sometimes comic on the surface, but the humor is infused with an underlying pessimism about the human condition. |
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