Talk:Theatre of the absurd/Archive 1

This is an archive of past discussions about Theatre of the absurd. Do not edit the contents of this page. If you wish to start a new discussion or revive an old one, please do so on the current talk page.

Archive 1

Absurdism vs. Surrealism?

Is anyone familiar with conflicts between Absurdists and Surrealists, or possibly Dadaists (as precursors of the Absurdists) and Surrealists? The English Surrealists, and George Melly in particular, may have been involved. Andy Dingley 16:23, 15 May 2007 (UTC)

Absurdism=Surrealism

I'm concerned about the underrepresentation of Surrealism on this page. To respond to several of these previous posts: I don't know about any conflicts between the Surrealists and the Absurdists but I would like to know more. To say that the philosophy of Sartre or even Camus falls in line with the philosophy of the actual writers of the Theatre of the Absurd I fear is perpetuating a common misrepresentation of Absurdism as a whole. I know most about Beckett and Ionesco so I'll refer specifically to them (feel free to respond with info about the other writers in case my assessment misses the mark). Both Beckett and Ionesco hated existentialism but had an admiration for Surrealism. Beckett's philosphy is rightly called pessimistic, but it's much more like nihilism than like Sartre's existentialism. Beckett had a mixed relationship with Sartre that can be called perhaps healthy respect without necessarily adherance to the philosphy. Beckett also had a mixed view of Surrealism. He loved it as an art form (and that's really what's most important when talking about an artform: not the philosophy but the artform itself); he translated many Surrealist poems into English, and he was friends with many of the Surrealists. But they hated Joyce so he could never fully join their cause. Ionesco on the other hand was a major admirer of Breton and the Surrealists. Ionesco once said he'd never consider himself an existentialist but instead either a Pataphysician (because he loved Jarry) or a Surrealist. If you read carefully Esslin's section of pre-cursors, half of the section is devoted to either Dadaists or Surrealists. Tzara and Breton are mentioned nowhere on this page. An even more shocking ommission: Antonin Artaud. His "Theatre of Cruelty" is considered a major foreshadowing of the Theatre of the Absurd, not to mention his direct connection to several Absurdists through the Alfred Jarry theatre. To leave this information out does noone a favor and perpetuates common misconsceptions. F. Simon Grant 19:51, 27 June 2007 (UTC)

Existentialism

The Theater of the Absurd seems to deal somewhat with types of plays and stories in which a higher power is not involved (existentialism). This varies greatly from that of the Elizabethan Theater which was firmly rooted in the Great Chain of Beings. That is to say God is at the top of the chain with angels below him saints below them, etc. That is why we see in plays such as Shakespeare's Hamlet the urgent need to correct the problem created by someone interrupting the Great Chain of Beings. God is supposed to give and take life. Yet in Hamlet, Claudius takes King Hamlet's life, therefore Prince Hamlet must correct it by avenging his father's death. Thus i'm not sure Theater of the Absurd has anything to do with Monty Python. MLT--74.242.21.92 01:38, 27 September 2007 (UTC)

This page needs attention

I haven't visited this page in a while (since June, I suppose) but I'm shocked it's still in such a sloppy state. I will try at some point to work on this page, but it's in need of some serious attention. It has ridiculous sentences like this:

"Most exemplary is Beckett's Waiting for Godot, a play about two bums that would have shocked the French audience, to say the least, attending the premiere performance at the Theatre de Babylone."

Both uniformative and way too informal. And it's still furthering the common misconception that Absurdism is Existentialist. Few Absurdists gave credence to Existentialism. Ionesco hated Sartre, for goodness sake. I'm sure he rolls over in his grave anytime somebody calls him an Existentialist. Esslin never said they were Existentialist. He said they embodied Camus' concept of the absurd. Camus didn't even call himself an Existentialist. To call them Existentialists is just lazy and insulting. And all the citations on this page are wrong. And most of the citations are either from Esslin or from anthologies -- is that really scholarly to have only two sources by the same author that's specifically about the subject? I will give it some attention as soon as I can. But please somebody out there help this sloppy, sloppy page.

One more just amazingly sloppy sentence:

"The 'Theatre of the Absurd' is thought to have its origins in Dadaism, nonsense poetry and avant-garde art of the 1910s – 1920s."

Okay, where to begin? Agreed, Dadaism had a big influence, but equal or greater influence came from the Surrealists, especially Antonin Artaud (see my rant above, though I didn't actually do anything about it -- that's a mistake I'll remedy soon). Nonsense poetry I assume refers to Lewis Carrol, Edward Lear, etc. That wasn't 1910's-20's. That was the late 1800's. Is the time frame meant to refer to nonsense poetry too? It's unclear. Finally, avant-garde is a very broad term. Dadaism is often categorized as avant-garde. Why go specific and broad in the same list? Why not give a specific list of influences? Why not say Alfred Jarry's Ubu Roi, Tristan Tzara's Gas Heart, Appolinaire's The Breasts of Tiresias, etc.? The page, as it is now, gives precursors in two or three or four different places. As I said, quite sloppy.F. Simon Grant (talk) 20:10, 21 December 2007 (UTC)

The article is full of plagiarism from unacknowledged sources and from pages of cited sources wherein the pages are not cited and there are missing quotation marks; material appears lifted from sources. The article needs extensive cleanup. I do not have time to do it; I just happened upon this article via a link in a related article. I've put templates indicating where the citations are missing both at top and in sections and added some editorial interpolations visible in show preview (edit) mode. The article needs a lot of work. The format of footnotes mixed up citations formats; it should use MLA format (see The MLA Style Manual); it is a literary topic and that format is consistent with literary topics. Footnotes are not alphabetized and there is no need for last name first name of authors in footnotes/notes in articles about literary topics. The references list is alphabetized and thus last name, first name order is used. It needs page number references in citations throughout and adequate documentation of many statements which appear to be plagiarized from sources (both those listed and perhaps those not listed). The most recent ed. of Esslin's book should be the one cited for statements in the article that are not making a distinction between what he published in 1961 and the most recent version of the book on "The Theatre of the Absurd." Parenthetical references are possible with MLA format; some of the notes could be converted to them throughout. --NYScholar (talk) 22:03, 2 March 2008 (UTC)

Hold on just a second there buddy. I've rewritten most of this page, please do tell me what is plagiarized. If it's something from this page that existed before I started fixing it, then I can't lay claim to it. If you're claiming my stuff is plagiarized, please let me know and I can prove it's not. As for the citations, I've acknowleged those need help. How bout you spend a second or two doing something useful and fix up a few of those citations. Some of us do this in our free time because we have a life and a job and don't have time to be nitpicky about every detail in a citation. On the citation front, this page was about a thousand times better than some of the wikipedia pages I've seen. Why don't you go ahead and criticize them without actually doing anything yourself to fix it. Notice, most of the earlier posts in which I complained about the quality of the page, I actually did something about it. Do I get a thank you? Yes, from the very polite and helpful RepublicanJacobite who actually does some work to fix things. There was a tremendous amount in this page to fix, pal, so why don't you shut up and get to fixin'. I personally don't have that couple of hours to spare at the moment. If you want to know where I got any of this info, please let me know. And, by the way, Fragments of a Journal is not a secondary source. Put a little leg work into your criticisms next time will ya!F. Simon Grant (talk) 17:58, 10 March 2008 (UTC)

By the way, here's an indication of what the page looked like before I seriously started working on it, it's just a little frustrating to go this far and have somebody drop some nitpickbitchings all over me: it's like you're working on The David and you take a break and somebody comes along and says, "Why, that doesn't look like a person at all, that just looks like a bunch of rocks." The citations will be fixed, pal, just don't get your panties in such a wad:

http://en.wikipedia.org/w/index.php?title=Theatre_of_the_Absurd&diff=179192235&oldid=179065067

Also, I can't vouch for the stuff on here before I started working on it: if you're calling me a plagiarizer, please do it in specific terms so I can prove you wrong. If your plagiarism claims are based on faulty citation, well then I'll fix it, but don't go throwing accusations like that around without the upfront proof.F. Simon Grant (talk) 18:21, 10 March 2008 (UTC)

Interdependent pairs?

I'm having difficulty with "The plots of many Absurdist plays feature characters in interdependent pairs." How is this specific in any way at all to absurdist themes? Tension (inter alia) creates drama, and interdependence creates tension. In Casablanca the drama resides in the tension of the interdependence of Rick and Ilse, in Gone with the wind with Rhett and Scarlett, in Who's afraid of Virginia Wolff with Martha and George, and so on. Tying interdependent pairs to Absurdism would seem to make the concept vacuous from a dramatic standpoint: what would be an example of a non-absurdist play or screenplay if the notion of interdependent pairs is supposed to have some bearing on the concept? --Vaughan Pratt (talk) 08:14, 7 February 2009 (UTC)

hullay! —Preceding unsigned comment added by 78.149.124.207 (talk) 17:17, 8 February 2009 (UTC)

I'm not sure what standard you're using here for something worth mentioning. Does a feature of a movement have to be exclusive to that movement? Shakespeare writes about man-as-victim-of-fate all the time -- well, so does everybody else, but does it mean it's not worth mentioning? If you see a man-as-victim-of-fate story, do you automatically think it's by Shakespeare? No. But does that automatically mean it's not worth mentioning? Perhaps the issue is specificity: The interdependence of pairs in absurdist drama is fairly extreme. Casablanca and Gone with the Wind are just complex romantic relationships -- with absurdist drama, the interdependence is both a mutual torture and necessity for survival. Rhett and Scarlett torture each other in the fairly realistic (if melodramatic) way people do in a relationship like that. Martha and George's mutual torture is a much more extreme kind that comes from something far different from one of them being a flighty busybody. And that doesn't even compare to the kind of absurd interdependence you get with Hamm and Clov from Endgame, or the extreme interpendence for the sake of survival you get with Didi and Gogo or Rosencrantz and Guildenstern or the old couple from The Chairs or pick any dozen Pinter plays. If this is still a problematic notion, Vaughn Pratt, please let me know, and please give a constructive suggestion for how to change the phrasing to satisfy your objection. I personally think it would be foolish to get rid of the notion entirely, and I think it could be fixed with some phrasing changes.F. Simon Grant (talk) 19:49, 20 March 2009 (UTC)

Peter Weiss

I have never before read anyone classify Peter Weiss' play Marat/Sade as characteristic of the “Theatre of the Absurd“. On the contrary, Weiss is known as an exponent of an interventionist theatre conception. Could anyone please add a plausible reference or delete this piece? --Diggindeeper (talk) 09:57, 13 February 2009 (UTC)

it's in Theatre of the Absurd p. 433, though esslin gives it a more sophisticated genealogy. You could argue that it belongs in the legacy section. DionysosProteus (talk) 00:08, 14 February 2009 (UTC)

Thank you. That comes as a surprise. I didn't read Esslin's line of reasoning. Still I wonder how many scholars went along with him. Peter Weiss could hardly have agreed to that categorization. --Diggindeeper (talk) 20:51, 18 February 2009 (UTC)

Yes. Personally, I'd argue that the category "theatre of the absurd" in itself is incoherent; despite Esslin's caveats and qualifications, it doesn't really make sense to lump Beckett, Genet, and Pinter together. Maybe Ionesco, as the weakest and least substantial of the bunch. There's so much more going on in the others, and in such different directions and aesthetics, that Esslin's analysis feels too crude and strategic (rather than theoretical, I guess). However regrettably, though, others have followed him in that analysis, so it should be documented here. DionysosProteus (talk) 23:15, 18 February 2009 (UTC)

I just love elitist snobbery on Wikipedia. It has the right odor of b.s. and irony to get me going each day. I don't own a television either, Jeeves. Oh wait, I feel my accent turning fake british and my nose turning subtely upward.F. Simon Grant (talk) 21:04, 20 March 2009 (UTC)

Thank you...

..F. Simon Grant, --it 'works for me'. Your suggested revision and edit(s), and your dedicated efforts improving this article are greatly appreciated here.--Jbeans (talk) 08:48, 5 November 2009 (UTC)

Indeed. I think that looks much better, especially if a definition of sorts can be added with "explanation of what "Absurd" means without going overboard". :) ChildofMidnight (talk) 15:54, 5 November 2009 (UTC)

Thanks for the positive feedback. Feedback is so frequently negative on Wikipedia, it's refreshing to get positive feedback every once in a while. In my opinion, the next step is definitely to make the definition work better and to expand the Esslin section with perhaps more explanation of the Camus stuff. I'll probably work with it some more when I get a free minute, so in the mean time, anybody feel free to work on making that better.F. Simon Grant (talk) 17:58, 6 November 2009 (UTC)

Sounds great, don't know about the accuracy though...

This new addition sounds great, but I don't know how accurate it is. I know for certain Ionesco and Pinter would have some serious problems with the idea of it: "Their work expressed the belief that in a godless universe human existence has no meaning or purpose and therefore all communication breaks down. Logical construction and argument gives way to irrational and illogical speech and to its ultimate conclusion, silence."F. Simon Grant (talk) 17:15, 7 July 2010 (UTC)

Could we just say, "According to Esslin's interpretation"? Would that work?F. Simon Grant (talk) 20:23, 16 August 2010 (UTC)

Introduction Context

This is for Child of Midnight specifically, but I would also like to open it up for general discussion. Child of Midnight tagged the introduction as lacking proper context. I would like to know specifics about this complaint: What specifically is unclear? What specifically should be changed? I'll take responsibility for much of the content of this page, but I didn't write the introduction. That was mostly written by NYScholar who spent a lot of time complaining about citation, didn't do much to improve the page as a whole beyond this introduction, and pretty much abandoned the page all together. Though I can't say I was fond of NYScholar's attitude and work ethic, I'm not sure I see what context is being left out of his/her introduction. The Theatre of the Absurd refers to a bunch of plays from the late 40's to the 60's designated by Martin Esslin as having a quality similar to Camus' concept of the absurd, the most notable playwrights being Beckett, Genet, Ionesco, Pinter, etc. What else do you need? That's pretty much it right there. Please be specific about what's missing or what's unclear. I would also like to invite others (especially NYScholar if he/she is still paying attention) to comment on what can be imporoved about the introduction.F. Simon Grant (talk) 20:04, 10 August 2009 (UTC)

Since I have gotten no response in over a month, let me make another suggestion and see if I get any response from this. Reading through NYScholar's introduction again, I notice much of it is quibbling over editions of Esslin's book and other minor details. What if we have a separate section early in body of the article just about the Esslin book and make the introduction just about the term, not about Esslin -- mentioning him only briefly, something like "Theatre of the Absurd, a term coined by Martin Esslin, refers to ..." and give all the difining characteristics. I think the Esslin stuff could and should be expanded, but I wouldn't expand it in the introduction, so a separate section about Esslin's book would be very useful in that way. Thoughts? Anybody?F. Simon Grant (talk) 18:28, 18 September 2009 (UTC)

The first sentence says "The Theatre of the Absurd (French: Théâtre de l'Absurde) is a designation for particular plays written by a number of primarily European playwrights in the late 1940s, 1950s, and 1960s, as well as to the style of theatre which has evolved from their work." What is doesn't say is what the term means, or why those plays have that designation. So maybe the problem isn't that it lacks context, but that it's nothing but context? At some point early in the article it would be good to say what theater of the absurd is. ChildofMidnight (talk) 00:00, 19 September 2009 (UTC)

The problem might be that the term "Absurd" comes from overly compelex Camusian ideas that are only tagentially related but should be explained in order to understand the term "Absurd" -- thanks to Esslin, explanation of this stuff is a lot more convoluted than it should be. But how could we make that better? The intro does explain the Camus thing, but it's obviously not user friendly. I'd like to get some feedback on my suggestion to move all the Esslin stuff from the intro into its own section. That way we could expand on Esslin and the original book, and in that context we could expand on the convoluted connection Esslin makes between these playwrights and a completely unconnected philosopher. We could then make the intro more concise and user friendly with a brief explanation of why these are supposedly "Absurd" plays. Maybe a useful brief comment in the intro would be something like: "Martin Esslin coined the term in his book Theatre of the Absurd, recognizing that despite their many differences playwrights such as Beckett, Ionesco, Pinter [etc.] share themes of man's absurd search for meaning in the universe" -- that's not a great sentence, and I'd spend a lot more time on it before making that a part of the intro, but you get the idea: a concise way to frame the topic. A brief list of common traits after that would then be useful, and that could be our entire introduction. I think all that quibbling about Esslin and Camus in the intro is more for people who already know what Theatre of the Absurd is. Please let me know if this sounds like i'm on the right track or if you have any major qualms with my suggestions.F. Simon Grant (talk) 00:23, 6 October 2009 (UTC)

Take a look at some editing I've done below, and please tell me what you think. I reread the intro several times, and I think it does explain the absurd, but I'm admittedly blind to problems because I'm overly familiar with the concept. It seems to me all the talk of different editions of Esslin's book right there in the intro is very distracting. I've extracted that from the intro so we can see what that looks like. I admit that Esslin stuff is necessary, but not for the intro. I reshuffled it to a different section. It's incomplete of course, but I just wanted to show what it might look like. Please discuss 1) What the intro would still be missing if we make this change (I put a tiny explanation of the term "Absurd" there, so just imagine that it's a great sentence that covers the term concisely); 2) Whether or not this structure works and if I should just not mess with it; 3) If the structure doesn't work, what other ways can we approach the problem?F. Simon Grant (talk) 16:13, 9 October 2009 (UTC)

Justification for edits made

(Original Version)

"The Theatre of the Absurd (French: Théâtre de l'Absurde) is a designation for particular plays of absurdist fiction, written by a number of primarily European playwrights in the late 1940s, 1950s, and 1960s, as well as to the style of theatre which has evolved from their work."

Why do we need to say that they are particular plays? Simply saying "plays" already separates particular plays out of the whole. Again, why primarily European? It is true that the playwrights were primarily European but this is an introduction and that is more specific knowledge. If the playwrights were not completely European, let's just say playwrights to include everybody. Finally, it's always better to span a time frame than list individual decades.

I also separated paragraphs which makes it more readable as well as allowing the reader to access information more quickly. Finally, I added some context to the Camus comment... I wasn't sure if that is what the original author was referencing but decided to include it anyway, just in case. Feel free to change that. However, it should have more context than simply stating: "similar to the way Albert Camus uses the term." That's not accessible to the average reader.

--Truelight234 (talk) 06:22, 24 February 2011 (UTC)

New Intro Suggestion

The Theatre of the Absurd (French: Théâtre de l'Absurde) is a designation for particular plays written by a number of primarily European playwrights in the late 1940s, 1950s, and 1960s, as well as to the style of theatre which has evolved from their work. The term is derived from Martin Esslin's 1961 book in which he recognizes a similarity between many of these plays and Albert Camus' concept of the absurd (a better sentence with a little bit more explanation of what "Absurd" means without going overboard)

Though the term is applied to a wide range of plays, some characteristics coincide in many of the plays: broad comedy, often similar to Vaudeville, mixed with horrific or tragic images; characters caught in hopeless situations forced to do repetitive or meaningless actions; dialogue full of clichés, wordplay, and nonsense; plots that are cyclical or absurdly expansive; either a parody or dismissal of realism and the concept of the "well-made play". Playwrights within the Theatre of the Absurd include Samuel Beckett, Eugene Ionesco, Harold Pinter, etc.

Esslin's book

The term was coined by the critic Martin Esslin, who made it the title of a book on the subject first published in 1961 and in two later revised editions; the third and final edition appeared in 2004, in paperback with a new foreword by the author. In the first edition of The Theatre of the Absurd, Esslin saw the work of these playwrights as giving artistic articulation to Albert Camus' philosophy that life is inherently without meaning as illustrated in his work The Myth of Sisyphus. In the first (1961) edition, Esslin presented the four defining playwrights of the movement as Samuel Beckett, Arthur Adamov, Eugène Ionesco, and Jean Genet, and in subsequent editions he added a fifth playwright, Harold Pinter–although each of these writers has unique preoccupations and techniques that go beyond the term "absurd."^[1]^[2] Other writers whom Esslin associated with this group include Tom Stoppard, Friedrich Dürrenmatt, Fernando Arrabal, Edward Albee, and Jean Tardieu.^[1]^[2] (with a lot of expansion here) It seems to me that the above captures the history of the first usage of the phrase (if that was in fact the first usage) but it still doesn't do much to explain usage or meaning. ChildofMidnight (talk) 04:55, 29 October 2009 (UTC)

Significant precursors

Though the label "Theatre of the Absurd" covers a wide variety of playwrights with differing styles, they do have some common stylistic precursors (Esslin [1961]).

References

^ ^a ^b Martin Esslin, The Theatre of the Absurd (Garden City, NY: Doubleday, 1961). (Subsequent references to this ed. appear within parentheses in the text.)
^ ^a ^b Martin Esslin, The Theatre of the Absurd, 3rd ed. (New York: Vintage [Knopf], 2004). (Subsequent references to this ed. appear within parentheses in the text.)

On the Summary of Camus' philosophy

The representation of the philosophy of Albert Camus on this page is highly misleading. Yes, Camus believed life was meaningless; however, this idea did not originate with him, and his philosophy of life went far beyond this. His central belief was that though humans exist for no purpose and are headed towards nothing, there is no reason why we should not be happy and content. The pessimism and nihilism present in the work of many of the writers mentioned on this page is much more akin to Jean Paul Sartre's existentialist ideas, which Camus was opposed to (although many lazy people lump Camus in with the exies for easy categorization). (arevolvingonob) 19:37 22 December 2005 (UTC)

--I found the Camusian connection inaccurate as well, especially given how the philosopher embraces the absurd (as arevolvingonob effectively points out above), and most definitely does not despair in it. Of course, this is a matter of opinion, but I feel like the playwrights discussed here never reach Camus's level of absurd recognition. Chibchub (talk) 22:46, 10 April 2012 (UTC)

Parallels in other media?

As it reads today, an excellent article, yet isn’t it limited by self-imposed constraints? Drama does not exist in a vacuum, requiring a degree of shared experience between writer and audience. What about works in other media, by the dramatists cited here or by others, that exhibit absurdist features?

A particular example that strikes me is the 1972 film Le Charme discret de la bourgeoisie, which you could rename “Six Characters in Search of a Dinner” or even “More of the Manuscript found at Saragossa”. Though Buñuel’s roots were in surrealism, his maturer work can be seen as more absurdist.

--Hors-la-loi (talk) 13:03, 19 March 2014 (UTC)

Works cited

User:Abarrack1, can you explain why this section is really needed? What's it's purpose? A section "Further reading exists"– and anyhow it should not be excessively long. I propose that "Works cited" be deleted. Rwood128 (talk) 18:22, 27 February 2018 (UTC)

User:Rwood128, this section was in existence when I first saw the page, but was not filled out well. The intention was to create a full list of sources included in both the notes section and the further reading section, but in an organized, recognizable format for ease of searching the list. talk

Stalin

Stalin's show trials of the late 1930's could be treated as an example, although murderous. — Preceding unsigned comment added by 79.77.163.188 (talk) 11:32, 6 July 2019 (UTC)

Deleted the Legacy Section

This section is so meaningless. Not a single concrete example is given of anything. The phrase that begins it, “echoes of elements”, is weak and vague. Also weak (without examples), are the phrases: “uses some of the techniques” “reminiscent of…” and “addresses some of the themes”. The fact that a comic book (?) has a drawing that merely resembles Becket and others — so what? It doesn’t contribute to a reader’s understanding of the topic of this article. (How does it resemble Becket — is it the nose? The haircut?) It might be meaningful to the comic book, but it’s not meaningful to theatre or to the topic of this article. This section includes a book dedication? The term in the heading, “legacy”, isn’t even defined. This section is a random collection that doesn’t contribute. So I deleted it. (Einbildungskraft) (talk) 12:21, 13 December 2020 (UTC)

[Esslin1961ed-1] Martin Esslin, The Theatre of the Absurd (Garden City, NY: Doubleday, 1961). (Subsequent references to this ed. appear within parentheses in the text.)

[Esslin2004ed-2] Martin Esslin, The Theatre of the Absurd, 3rd ed. (New York: Vintage [Knopf], 2004). (Subsequent references to this ed. appear within parentheses in the text.)

[1]

[2]