The emergence of the theater of the absurd. The historical background of the origin of the drama of the absurd

Historical background the birth of the drama of the absurd. The concept of "Theater of the absurd"

The genre of absurdity in Great Britain originated mainly in the second half of the 20th century and had a certain socio-cultural and historical context.

Despite the devastating effects of the Second World War, the second half of the 20th century turned into a period of peaceful prosperity. Great Britain has come face to face with globalization and the needs of a post-industrial society. In this section, we will look at the historical and social preconditions for the emergence of this genre. play absurd linguistic stoppard

With regard to changes in public and everyday life people, we can distinguish the following prerequisites:

1) "Consumer Society". Post-war reconstruction brought the economy to full recovery. This was the symbolic beginning of the era of "consumer society". Societies where high wages and plenty of free time have provided a standard of living that the country has never known before.
2) Education. One of the important factors of prosperity was the incredible rise in the level of education among the entire population. Access to higher education provided a larger number of students and, as a result, an increase in the number of specialists with higher education.
3) Youth culture . The conservatism inherent in the first half of the 20th century has given way to tolerance towards social, religious and ethnic differences. The emergence of youth culture took place against the background of the denial of strict moral principles by young people themselves, the emergence of freedom of thought and action. People wanted just such a society - consisting of free individuals with independent views, choosing a way of life far from what the masses are used to.
4) Immigration flows . The post-war environment prompted the immigration of hundreds of thousands of Irish, Indians and Pakistanis, which played a special role in the reconstruction, although it was met with an unprecedented level of hostility from the British. It was necessary to create special laws, one of which was the Race Relations Act (1976), which provided enormous assistance in resolving ethnic conflicts. Despite the fact that certain racial prejudices persist to this day, in the second half of the 20th century, a big step was taken towards fostering respect and tolerance towards representatives of various ethnic groups. (Brodey, Malgaretti, 2003: 251-253)

Economically, social pressure and unemployment reigned everywhere. Although prosperity spread throughout Europe, vast numbers of workers and their families faced a crisis of job losses. The closure of mines, automobile and metallurgical plants led to unemployment and social fluctuations in the 70s and 80s of the 20th century.

For example, in 1984 there was the largest miners' strike in the history of Great Britain. Margaret Thatcher met with fierce opposition from workers when she tried to close coal mines. However, this was only the beginning. The years of Thatcher's reign were marked by many similar cases (strikes of railway workers, representatives of public utilities, etc.)

All of the above factors, of course, could not but affect the cultural aspect of human life. New forms of expressing reality were needed, new ways of communicating philosophy and the complexity of life to people. The answer to this need was the emergence of many modern genres of culture and literature, one of which was the theater of the absurd.

In literature, since 1960 Great Britain has been swept by a wave of publishing new works. Many of them were written only for quantity, many have survived to this day as examples of quality literature. Nonetheless, contemporary literature it is difficult enough to classify, because, despite all the differences between genres and works, they are all designed to reflect the kaleidoscope of modern existence. Postmodern art has spread to many areas of human life, however, one thing is clear - British literature has opened new horizons for readers modern life, expressing it, at times, in forms that are not quite familiar to the reader. (Brodey, Malgaretti 2003)

While prose and poetry moved away from the new canons of the 20th century, the drama studied and used them. Traditional theatrical art described the aspirations and desires of the upper class of British society, excluding any kind of experimentation, both with language and with the production process. Nevertheless, at the same time, Europe was completely absorbed in the abandonment of tradition in favor of novelty and conceptuality, embodying the plays of Eugene Ionesco on the stage.

Plays by E. Ionesco were called absurd, because the plot and dialogues were very difficult to understand, revealing their illogicality. The absurdists gained complete freedom to use language, playing with it, involving the viewer in the performance itself. There were no unnecessary distractions in the form of scenery, the viewer was completely absorbed in what was happening on stage. Even the consistency of the dialogues was perceived as a factor distracting from understanding the meaning and idea of \u200b\u200bthe play.

The genre of absurdity appeared in the middle of the twentieth century in Western Europe, as one of the directions of drama. The world in plays of this genre is presented as a pile of facts, words, deeds, thoughts, devoid of any meaning.

The very term "theater of the absurd" was first used by the famous theater critic Martin Esslin, who saw in certain works the embodiment of the idea of \u200b\u200bthe meaninglessness of life as such.

This direction of art was fiercely criticized, but, nevertheless, gained unprecedented popularity after the Second World War, which only emphasized the uncertainty and instability of human life. In addition, the term itself was criticized. There have even been attempts to redefine it as anti-theater.

In practice, the theater of the absurd calls into question the realism of being, people, situations, thoughts, and all the usual classical theatrical techniques. The simplest causal relationships are destroyed, the categories of time and space are blurred. All the illogicality, meaninglessness and aimlessness of the action are aimed at creating an unreal, maybe even eerie atmosphere.

The birthplace of absurdism was France, although its founders were the Irishman Samuel Beckett and the Romanian Eugene Ionesco, who worked in French, i.e. foreign language. And although Ionesco was a bilingual (he spent his childhood in Paris), it was the feeling of a “non-native” language that gave him the opportunity to consider linguistic phenomena from the point of view of the absurd, relying on the lexical structure as the main construction of the architectonics of plays. The same is undoubtedly true of S. Beckett. An obvious drawback - working in a foreign language - turned into an advantage. Language in absurdist plays acts as an obstacle to communication, people speak and do not hear each other.

Despite the relative youth of this trend, it managed to become quite popular due to the logic of illogicality. And absurdism is based on serious philosophical ideas and cultural roots.

First of all, it is worth mentioning the relativistic theory of knowledge of the world - a worldview that denies the very possibility of knowing objective reality

Also, the formation of absurdism was greatly influenced by existentialism - a subjective-idealistic philosophical direction, built on irrationalism, a tragic attitude, illogicalness of the world around and its inability to control man.

By the early 1960s, absurdism was spreading beyond the borders of France and rapidly spreading throughout the world. However, nowhere else did absurdism appear in its pure form. Most of the playwrights who can be attributed to this direction are not so radical in the technical devices of absurdism. They preserve the tragic outlook and the main problematics, reflecting the absurdity and contradictoriness of situations, often refuse to destroy the plot and plot, lexical experiments, and their heroes are concrete and individual, situations are certain, and social motives are very often manifested. Their embodiment is in a realistic display of reality, which cannot be the case with the plays of S. Beckett and E. Ionesco.

However, what is important, the absurdist technique in the 1960s received an unexpected development in a new direction of visual art - performance (the original name was happening), the works of which are any actions of the artist that take place in real time. The performance is not based on the semantic and ideological categories of absurdism, but uses its formal devices: the absence of a plot, the use of a cycle of “free flowing images”, the dismemberment of the structure - lexical, essential, ideological, existential.

Playwrights-absurdists often used not just absurdity, but reality in its manifestations, reduced to absurdity. The method of bringing to absurdity is a method when what one wants to deny is initially taken as the truth. We take a false judgment and make it true with our entire existence in accordance with the method of making it absurd. The paradox arises only as a result of the use of circumstantial evidence. We take a false (incomplete) judgment and make it true according to the method of absurdity.

Thus, using the method of reduction to a contradiction, the author implements the formula "as required to prove". Although the reader himself is capable of arriving at this conclusion, here we cannot yet speak of any logical internal form works. There is only the point of view of the character, "false", and the author's point of view, "true" - they are in direct opposition. The author makes the hero follow his logic to the end. The logical impasse to which the writer leads his hero by the method of reducing to the absurd is obviously part of the author's intention. Therefore, we consider absurd plots as a kind of thought experiments. (Http://ru.wikipedia.org/wiki/)

But in other cases, the author is not limited to such a simple and formal solution to the problem. The hero continues to insist on his own, he is obsessed with his idea, he does not feel that he has crossed the boundaries of common sense. All this gives the plot of the work an absurd character. Expanding an idea towards the absurd is a process that does not always depend on the will of the author and his intentions. Now the author must follow his hero, whose point of view is moving out of a static position and acquiring dynamics. The entire artistic world, the entire structure of the work turns upside down: the idea itself, the "false" one, which, as it were, takes away the author's right to vote and builds reality independently becomes the center of the work. The idea organizes the artistic world not according to the laws of common sense, as, for example, the author would have done, but according to its own absurd laws. The author's point of view is blurred. In any case, it does not have a visible predominance in this particular fragment of the text, but to what extent the author initially disagreed with this "impeccable" idea, how much he is now afraid of it and does not believe in it. And, of course, the hero of the work meets the author where his insensitivity reaches the limit. The hero is frightened either by the consequences of his theories, or by the theory itself, which can sometimes lead very far, come into conflict not only with ethics, but also with common sense itself.

The most popular absurdist play by S. Beckett "Waiting for Godot" is one of the first examples of the Theater of the Absurd, which critics point to. Written and first staged in France in 1954, the play had an extraordinary impact on theater-goers with its new and strange rules. Composed of desolate scenery (with the exception of a virtually leafless tree, clown-like vagabonds, and highly symbolic language), Godot encourages the public to question all the old rules and try to find meaning in a world that is impossible to know. The heart of the play is the theme of "endurance" and "living the day" so that tomorrow there will be strength to continue. In terms of structure, Godot is basically a cyclical two-act piece. It begins with two lonely vagabonds waiting on a country road for the arrival of a man called Godot, and ends with a starting position. Many critics have concluded that the second act is simply a repetition of the first. In other words, Vladimir and Estragon can be forever "waiting for Godot." We will never know if they found a way out of this situation. As the audience, we can only watch them repeat the same actions, listen to them repeat the same words, and accept the fact that Godou may or may not come. Much like them, we are stuck in a world where our actions determine existence. We may be looking for answers or the meaning of life, but most likely we will not find them. Thus, this piece is structured in such a way as to make us believe that Godot may never come, and that we must accept the uncertainty in our daily lives. The two main characters, Vladimir and Estragon, spend their days bringing the past to life, trying to find a meaning for their existence, and even viewing suicide as a form of salvation. However, as characters, they are absurdist prototype images that remain isolated from the public. They are essentially lacking in personality and their vaudeville demeanor, especially when it comes to contemplating suicide, makes the audience laugh rather than tragically. (http://ru.wikipedia.org/wiki/)

For another representative of this genre, E. Ionesco, absurdity is a tool, a way of thinking, the main opportunity to break through the grid of indifference that tightly clothe the consciousness of a modern person. Absurdity is a look from a completely unexpected point of view and a look that is refreshing. He can shock, surprise, but this is exactly what can be used to break through mental blindness and deafness, because this is against the usual.

The situations, characters and dialogues of his plays follow images and associations of dreams rather than everyday reality. The language, with the help of funny paradoxes, cliches, sayings and other word games, is freed from the usual meanings and associations. The origin of the play by E. Ionesco stems from the street theater, commedia dell "arte, circus clownery. A typical technique is a pile of objects that threaten to swallow the actors; things take on life, and people turn into inanimate objects." Circus Ionesco "is a term quite often applied to his early drama, while he recognized only an indirect connection between his art and surrealism, more readily - with dada.

Achieving the maximum effect of the impact, Eugene Ionesco "attacks" the usual logic of thinking, leads the viewer into a state of ecstasy with the absence of the expected development. Here, as if following the precepts of the street theater, he demands improvisation not only from the actors, but also the viewer, in confusion, makes the viewer look for the development of what is happening on the stage and outside it. Problems that were once perceived as just another non-figurative experiment are beginning to acquire the qualities of relevance.

Also, in full this description of the nature and essence of the plays of the genre of absurdity refers to the works of Tom Stoppard and Daniil Kharms.

What is "theater of the absurd"? Which performances are allowed to be illogical, and which directors are allowed to turn nonsense into revelation? Our review contains exemplary performances of the most original genre. The ones to watch first.

Adherents of the absurd in art in general, following the founders of the genre (Ionesco, Beckett), assert the meaninglessness of human existence and perceive the world as a dump of waste ("heap of actions, words and destinies" — Wikipedia). Causal relationships in their creations are often absent, and the characters cannot understand each other. Let the "theater of the absurd" in its direct and precise meaning is rare, but the absurdist aesthetics is becoming noticeably more popular. It already extends not only to the classics of the absurd, but also to the classics in general. The recognized master here, of course, is Yuri Pogrebnichko, whose performances "Yesterday came suddenly ..." and "The penultimate concert of Alice in Wonderland" by Milne and Carroll, respectively, have long turned into a cult. But today Butusov also "tailors" Shakespeare, Krymov turns Chekhov into a modern horror film, and in the Gogol Center and the MTYuZ they are imbued with love for Kharms and Vvedensky. What they all do in the end is highly deserving of the audience's attention. The kitsch, which any flirtation with the genre of the absurd could well turn into, is absent here. Instead - taste, style and philosophical depth.

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Satyricon

Excessive, eccentric, master of stage shocking. Yuri Butusov turned Shakespeare's Othello into something unimaginable. In a kind of theatrical mass that connects the incompatible: Shakespeare's turned inside out (in three translations at once: Soroka, Leitin and Pasternak), Pushkin, Chekhov and Akhmatova. An energetic mix of such power that not every spectator can stand it.
A phenomenal find is the black paint that the white-skinned Othello-Denis Sukhanov applies to his face and hands. As if hell demonstrates its rights, with such a “mark” it will no longer be possible to live as before.
There are also crowds of women with leaked mascara, with breasts invocatively popping out of deep cleavage, with frantic melancholy in their eyes. Lurid men-cowards and silent servants-invisible ... An excerpt from "Ruslan and Lyudmila", dancing on the piano and even "nudity".
Butusov makes riddles, but does not even hint at clues. Only the artist Alexandra Shishkin has mastered the insane cipher of the director's thought. There are mountains of rubbish on the stage. Cardboard boxes, hangers, crumpled coats of unknown production year, artificial flowers, beds, a skull and even a ship on wooden cables ... From so many things dazzle in the eyes, the meaning of each of them on stage is unclear. But the chaos of this world is discernible and “patented”. Only in the dump does love so quickly turn into hatred, and speculation into a sentence.

photo by Ekaterina Tsvetkova

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Near

Absurdity in the theater. Source: Absurdity in the theater.

The performance, which connects Volodin's play Don't Part with Your Beloved, with the main scenes from Dostoevsky's novel, is both a philosophical statement about the eternal and the most satire on our worthless, absurd everyday life, terrible past and unknown future.
Here in front of us is a string of married couples, whose "love boat has crashed against everyday life." “Drinks, beats”, “got a woman”, “cheated”, “no common interests” ... their explanations in court are familiar to the ear, do not evoke emotions. But Pogrebnichko and Pogrebnichko are to turn everyday dramas into frantic and eternal absurdity. So, mental anguish in the presence of a judge (Olga Beshulya plays her flawlessly) turns into a homerically funny show called “divorce in a Soviet country”. Scenes from Dostoevsky's novel seem to creep into this show (fortunately, there is no need to change - crinolines of the 19th century and quilted jackets from the times of the scoop in this theater have always been perfectly combined). Porfiry Petrovich brings Raskolnikov to the surface, Raskolnikov explains with Sonechka Marmeladova, etc. Then suddenly again the metaphysical abysses are replaced by the Soviet "everyday", and then completely - the choral performance of hits from the past: "Daisies hid, buttercups drooped" All this "mess" in an incomprehensible way sounds hysterical, but without pathos. At what it sounds about the most important thing: about the pain that in people and their relationships is eternal. About how terrible it is that no one knows how to pain this and does not want to calm it down.

photo by Victor Pushkin

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School of Dramatic Art

Absurdity in the theater. Source: Absurdity in the theater.

The play is based on one single phrase from “Three Sisters” (“Balzac got married in Berdichev”), the rest is a genius horror from Dmitry Krymov, a master of stage puzzles and visual metaphors. His fantasy does not obey any theatrical laws or even simple logic. Chekhov for him is just an excuse for his own experiment.
Krymov and his team turned the Chekhov sisters into ugly clowns, some kind of witches from a fantastic horror story. Masha got bumps on her legs, Anna Akhmatova's nose appeared from somewhere. Irina's ears became gigantic, and Olga turned into a gray plump bun. Ugly, miserable. As, however, and everyone else. Judge for yourself: Vershinin is without an arm. Salty - with three. Andrei in a woman's dress and with a pregnant belly, Chebutykin in the guise of an inept maniac doctor. The heroes are clearly not aware of their own inferiority - they cheerfully eat a watermelon on stage (ah, what a scene!), Hypnotize tea cups, make fun of each other, burn a paper city in a copper basin. There is not even a trace of dialogues from the play, as well as the viscous atmosphere of "doing nothing". On the stage, something happens all the time, now hilariously funny, now piercingly sad, and sometimes tragic. The director deliberately deprives the viewer of the fulcrum - whether everything that happened on stage is funny or scary - is ultimately not obvious. Not a single scene in the new play can be predicted. Perhaps you won't even be able to understand right away. But the meaning, the idea, is impossible not to grasp. We are all funny little freaks who live as if they are immortal and grief does not exist. But sooner or later, both death and grief happen. And sorry for everyone.

photo by Mikhail Guterman

Lecture 30. New theater (drama of the absurd)

This is a type of contemporary drama (the so-called "New Theater", initially ignored by the public), based on the concept of a person's total alienation from the physical and social environment. This kind of plays first appeared in the early 1950s in France, and then spread to Western Europe and the United States.

This is the theater of "drama of the absurd", created by S. Beckett, E. Ionesco, A. Adamov, who lived in Paris and wrote in French. It was, on the one hand, an attempt to renew the structure and language of the theater, and on the other, the New Theater reflected the horror caused by the atrocities of war and the fear of atomic destruction.

The roots of the theater of the absurd can be found in the theoretical and practical activities of representatives of such aesthetic movements of the early 20th century as Dadaism and Surrealism, as well as in A. Jarry's epic burlesque King I Kill (1896), in Sostsi Tiresias (1903) by G. Apollinaire, where farce and vaudeville are combined, in the plays of F. Wedekind with the irrational aspirations of his heroes. The theater of the absurd also absorbed the elements of clownery, music hall, Chaplin's comedies.

The formation of the drama of the absurd (antidrama) was influenced by surreal theatricality: the use of bizarre costumes and masks, meaningless rhymes, provocative appeals to the audience, etc. The plot of the play, the behavior of the characters are incomprehensible, similar and sometimes designed to shock the audience. Reflecting the absurdity of mutual understanding, communication, dialogue, the play emphasizes in every possible way the lack of meaning in the language, and that, in the form of a kind of game without rules, becomes the main carrier of chaos.

It was a conceptual drama that realized the ideas of absurdist philosophy. Reality, being was presented as chaos. For the absurdists, the dominant quality of being was not concise, but disintegration. The second significant difference from the previous drama is in relation to a person. A person in an absurd world is the personification of passivity and helplessness. He cannot be aware of anything except his own helplessness. He is deprived of freedom of choice. The absurdists developed their own concept of drama - anti-drama. Back in the 30s, Antonei Artaud spoke about his perspective of the theater: the rejection of the depiction of a person's character, the theater moves to a total depiction of a person. All the heroes of the drama of the absurd are total people. Events also need to be considered from the point of view of the fact that they are the result of certain situations created by the author, within which a picture of the world opens. The drama of the absurd is not a discussion of the absurd, but a demonstration of absurdity.

UNESCO UNESCO: Eugène Ionesco's talent manifested itself both in his early poems and in critical articles that gave rise to real revolutions and upheavals in Romanian society, but he burns brightest in his theatrical activities.Eugene Ionesco is the pioneer of absurdism in French drama.The Ionesco Theater is a theater of mockery and parody. Eugene Ionesco put on stage and ridiculed the emptiness and its absurdity of the world. It opposes traditional theatrical vocabulary. Many did not understand this vocabulary, considering it devoid of any meaning, calling his plays "nonsense". But he defended his right and the title of a famous playwright of our century, which is proved by the numerous awards he received. In most of Ionesco's plays, the idea of \u200b\u200bthe uselessness of language as a means of communication is promoted.

“Reality should be enriched with absurdity, fantasy and free self-expression of the individual,” the author himself believes. And I think everyone will agree with that.

The surrealism of Ionesco's plays traces its origins to circus clownery, films by C. Chaplin, B. Keaton, the Marx brothers, ancient and medieval farce. A typical technique is a pile of objects that threaten to swallow the actors; things take on life, and people turn into inanimate objects.

In the absurdist plays, catharsis is absent, E. Ionesco rejects any ideology, but the plays were brought to life by deep concern for the fate of the language and its speakers.

The most famous plays by Eugene Ionesco are "The Bald Singer" and "The Lesson". These plays denounce the conservatism, morality and ideology of our world. From the first time, it really may seem that you are reading nonsense, but rereading or pondering over, you will notice that it is not so absurd in the book, but absurd in reality. Comic passages, "absence" of meaning are juxtaposed with languid reflections on human existence, which is marked by loneliness and death. The play "The King is Dying" tells about these reflections.

For all the conventionality of the theater of the absurd, it is thoroughly politicized, which is especially convincingly proved by the most significant creation of Eugene Ionesco "Rhino" (1959).Ionesco also shows the mechanisms that facilitate the establishment of certain ideologies. Thus, in the play "Rhino", the inhabitants of a small town are metaphorically presented on the stage, worried about the appearance of a rhino and are gradually turning into it. This play denounces totalitarianism.

Eugene Ionesco, like the existentialists J.P. Sartre and A. Camus, explores human behavior in an extreme situation when the vast majority of people submit to circumstances and only a loner finds the strength for internal confrontation.

A feature of the plays by E. Ionesco is that they are, as it were, encrypted. Sometimes they are difficult to solve, but with "Rhino" everything is clear: the drama is about fascism.

Eugène Ionesco's dramaturgy has taken a prominent place in the literary process and in the repertoire of French and world theater. However, this does not at all mean that absurdism won out and the traditional realistic drama left the stage. An ordinary and helpless person in everyday life goes one against everyone.

Literary glory in the early 1950s brought Ionesco play "The Bald Singer", the history of writing which largely reveals the essence of his writing method. Having decided to master the English language in 1948, the writer bought a self-instruction manual and suddenly discovered what a storehouse of absurdity our everyday speech is, especially in relation to reality. And I thought about the original and gradually lost meaning of words. From the juxtaposition of words and meanings, Ionesco's “unpleasant” theater was born, which was later called absurdist.However, the absurdity of Ionesco is not a deliberate absurdization of being (Ionesco himself, by the way, preferred to call the artistic direction to which he belonged, the theater of paradox), but the ultimate exposure of its true essence.

The premiere of "The Bald Singer" took place in Paris. The success of The Bald Singer was scandalous, no one understood anything, but watching absurdist plays gradually became a good form.

“Bald girl”. In the drama itself, there is no one who looks like a bald girl. The phrase itself makes sense, but in principle it is meaningless. The play is full of absurdity: 9 o'clock, and the clock strikes 17 times, but no one in the play notices this. Every time you try to fold something, it ends in nothing.

In the anti-play (this is the genre designation), there is no bald singer at all. But there is an English couple of Smiths and their neighbor by the name of Martin, as well as a maid Mary and a fire brigade captain who accidentally dropped in for a minute to the Smiths. He is afraid of being late for the fire, which will start at such and such hours and some minutes. There is also a clock that strikes as it pleases, which apparently means that time is not lost, it simply does not exist, each is in its own time dimension and carries, accordingly, nonsense.

The playwright has several techniques for whipping up the absurd. There is confusion in the sequence of events, and a heap of the same names and surnames, and the spouses' lack of recognition of each other, and the castling of hosts-guests, guests-hosts, countless repetitions of the same epithet, a stream of oxymorons, a clearly simplified construction of phrases like in the English textbook for beginners. In short, the dialogues are really funny.

Samuel BECKET: Beckett was Joyce's secretary and learned to write from him. “Waiting for Godot” is one of the basic texts of absurdism. Beckett's play Waiting for the Year, staged in 1952, is the most famous play in the theater of the absurd, representing a life devoid of meaning. The fundamental difference between B.'s play from previous dramas that broke with the traditions of psychological theater is that no one previously set out to stage "nothing". B. allows you to develop in the play word by word, despite the fact that the conversation begins all of a sudden, and does not come to anything, as if the characters initially know that it will not work out to agree on anything, that wordplay is the only option for communication and convergence. Dialogue becomes an end in itself. But the play also has a certain dynamic. Everything repeats, changing just enough to warm up the audience's expectation of some kind of change.

Entropy (the release of energy in a reaction, a chemical term) is presented in a state of expectation, and this expectation is a process, the beginning and end of which we do not know, i.e. it makes no sense. The state of expectation is the dominant in which the heroes exist, while not thinking about whether to wait for Godot. They are in a passive state.

The play Waiting for Godot is one of those works that influenced the overall appearance of the 20th century theater. Beckett basically refuses any kind of dramatic conflict, the plotline familiar to the viewer. The characters of the play - Vladimir (Didi) and Estragon (Gogo) - look like two clowns, having nothing to do, entertaining each other and at the same time the audience. They do not act, but imitate some action. It is not aimed at revealing the psychology of the characters. The action does not develop linearly, but moves in a circle, clinging to the refrains that one accidentally dropped replica generates. Not only remarks are repeated, but also positions. At the beginning of Act 2, the tree, the only attribute of the landscape, is covered with leaves, but the essence of this event eludes the characters and spectators. This is not a sign of spring, the progressive movement of time. Rather emphasizes the falsehood of expectations.

The heroes (Volodya and Estragon) are not completely sure that they are waiting for Godot in the very place where they need it. When the next day after night they come to the same place to the withered tree, Tarragon doubts that it is the same place. The set of items is the same, only the tree blossomed overnight. Tarragon's boots, which he left on the road yesterday, are in the same place, but he claims that they are larger and of a different color.

The play is seen as the quintessence of Beckett: behind the longing and horror of human existence in its most unsightly form, an inevitable irony appears. The characters in the play are reminiscent of the Maris brothers, the great comedians of silent films.

Waiting for Godot. Summary

Country road, endless fields, almost desert, whose monotony is broken only by one tree. There are almost no leaves on the tree. There are two tramps at its foot.

Tarragon, unsuccessfully trying to take off his shoes and his friend and brother Vladimir. He is worried about the question of which of the four evangelists told the truth about the two crucified robbers. A series of banal phrases devoid of any meaning, which are exchanged only in order to revive the silence of this dull place. The only thing that keeps them here is the promise of a certain Godou to come. What is left for them to do while waiting, if not to kill time, endless time that needs to be filled with empty arguments, and at the same time pretend that they take them to heart ... They themselves do not know why they are together, they are used to parting and dating every day in the same place. The noise is somewhere in the other direction, a terrible cry ... Isn't Godou coming? Tarragon drops the carrot, which he chewed before, freezes, rushes towards ...

Pozzo and Luke appear. The latter has a rope around his neck; he carries his master's suitcases. Pozzo, whip in hand, treats his slave in the same way that animals are not treated. And if Vladimir and Estragon are here, why not stop and smoke a pipe? It will kill time, and Pozzo loves to talk. He explains that he is going to sell Luke, who is no longer good for anything. He can only think. In addition, it carries with it if you push it. Finally, it is enough to take off his hat for him to become an animal again, a simpleton. They stay for quite a long time, then go away with a bang.

What to do? Leave? No, Godou promised to come, you need to wait for him. Resigned to fate, Vladimir and Estragon are trying to discuss the insignificant events that marked the day, but they have no strength, they are tired to successfully play a comedy of imaginary interest.

A voice is heard from behind the curtains: "Mister (...)". A child comes and says that Godot will not come, as in previous evenings, but he will definitely be tomorrow. Tomorrow comes, all the same meaningless dialogues, without meaning, a repetition of yesterday's conversation, and maybe the day before yesterday, and daily. Luke and Pozzo reappear, they have aged; Pozzo is blind, and Luke is even more worthless, he is dumb. But the rope is still there, a little shorter so that Pozzo can follow his slave, who is now wearing a new hat.

At the sight of Vladimir and Estragon, Luke makes a sharp dash and falls, dragging Pozzo with him. Pozzo is calling for help, that's who is really funny! Besides, it wastes time. Two vagabonds pounce on Pozzo, kick him, pick him up - you need to have fun, talk ... As for Godot, he again sends an apology, he will come tomorrow; maybe the way out is to hang from a tree on Tarragon's belt? But the belt breaks ...

So what! They'll be back tomorrow with a good rope, and if Godou suddenly comes, they'll be saved ...

STOPPARD: “Rosencrantz and Guildenstern are dead” - here is a characteristic feature of English literature: the British were well aware of their history, every writer feels like a part of this tradition. This play has 2 readings: 1) either the action takes place after the death of Rosencrantz and Guildenstern; 2) either it all seems to Rosencrantz and Guildenstern. But the play is based on Shakespearean thought. There is nothing in the replicas of the heroes that would allow us to distinguish one from the other. Stoppard uses this characteristic. In the center of the play is the question "which of us is Rosencrantz, and who is Guildenstern?" These are 2 human beings who have names that distinguish one from the other. For them, to understand who is who means an opportunity to stand out, to find their “I”. But according to the theory of absurdism, this is impossible, so the absurdists do not give names to their heroes. Man is not given to separate his “I” from chaos.

The foregoing, in our opinion, gives grounds to assert that it is inappropriate to speak of any crisis, at least in relation to the theater of the 20th century. True, one cannot discount one phenomenon of the 20th century, which can be considered a manifestation of the crisis, but not of culture. The growth of well-being due to the scientific and technological revolution of the overwhelming majority of the population of Europe, the establishment of democratic tendencies in life led to the actual power in this life of the uncreative majority, unable to live with the ideas and ideals of true culture, unable to rise above the world of everyday life, and this anti-elitism of most of the population did creativity-oriented, culturally destructive.

A manifestation of this trend, starting from the 60s of the XX century. throughout Europe, including France, is the development of show business. Mass circulation of records, cassettes of "disco", "folk", "rock" music, from morning to evening thundering in the headphones of transistors, everywhere accompany boys and girls1.

However, along with the spread of show business and other negative phenomena in the spiritual life of Europe in the XX century. the culture that uplifts a person continues to exist and develop, which is the criterion of its authenticity, regardless of the genre.

Search for new theatrical forms

In the last two decades, the theatrical life in France, like in Europe as a whole, has become more diverse. In Paris alone, there are currently over 50 theaters, in which the viewer can find performances for every taste: from the eternal creations of the classics - Shakespeare, Corneille, Racine, Chekhov - in the "Comedie Francaise" and "Odeon" to modern playwrights Beckett and Ionesco in the avant-garde theaters and witty comedies in the "theaters of the boulevards". Theater festivals are held annually in Avignon, Orange, Nimes and other cities in France on ancient Roman arenas or in medieval castles, attracting thousands of spectators from many countries.

Similar spectacular events are practiced in Italy: on the ruins of the Forum, the Colosseum, the Thermal Baths of Caracalla, amazing performances are held, staging of classical Italian operas on ancient subjects. Thus, the staging of Verdi's opera Aida in the Baths of Caracalla creates an exciting feeling of the viewer's presence in the thick of the events.

All this is a search for new theatrical forms accessible to the mass of spectators. An example of such a combination of mass character and classics is R. Ossein's grandiose performances at the Paris Palace of Sports of the performances Notre Dame Cathedral, Danton and Robespierre, The Man from Nazareth, and Battleship Potemkin.

Claude Carrer, in collaboration with the famous English director Peter Brook, staged the ancient Indian epic Mahabharata at the Boof du Nord theater in Paris. The scale of this performance is evidenced by the fact that it ran either for three evenings, or for twelve hours in a row from 12 noon to 12 noon. Spectators, who came from many European countries, stocked up thermos with coffee and sandwiches and “heroically hatched to the end,” as the Parisian newspapers wrote in 1986, when this performance was staged.

1 Doctors note an increase in the disorder due to this reason of the hearing aid in young people.

In the middle of the 20th century, a phenomenon called "theater of the absurd" appeared in European drama. It has become truly innovative and unusual for the viewer accustomed to classical "logical" performances. But, despite this, the new art aroused curiosity and interest. What is the theater of the absurd and what rethinking has it received today?

Description

The focus of the absurdist play is not action and intrigue, but the author's perception and individual understanding of any problem. Moreover, everything that happens on the stage is devoid of logical connection. This is done so that the viewer is confused, able to get rid of the patterns in his mind and look at his life from several angles at once.

At first glance, the world in such "illogical" plays appears as a chaotic, meaningless heap of facts, characters, actions, words, in which there is no definite place and time of action. However, upon careful consideration, the logical connection between all these elements is present, only it is strikingly different from what we were used to before. The most striking theatrical embodiments of the principles of absurdism were the plays by E. Ionesco "The Bald Singer" and S. Beckett "Waiting for Godot". This is a kind of parody (or philistinism) of the bourgeois world of comfort, its fascisation. In these plays, one can clearly observe the disintegration of the connections between word and action, the violation of the dialogue structure itself.

Despite the seriousness and scale of the social problems involved, the world of the theater of the absurd is incredibly comical. Playwrights show reality, society is already at that stage of decay, when nobody is sorry. Therefore, in plays of this genre, parodies, cynicism, and laughter reactions are readily used. The viewer is clearly given to understand that it is useless and pointless to fight this surreal world of absurdity. You just need to believe in it and accept it.

History

It is noteworthy that the very term “theater of the absurd” appeared after the emergence of innovative productions. It belongs to theater critic Martin Esslin, who published a book in 1962 under that title. He drew parallels between the new dramatic phenomenon and the philosophy of existentialism of A. Camus, Dadaism, poetry from non-existent words and the avant-garde art of the early 20th century. All this to a certain extent, according to the critic, "educated" the theater of the absurd and shaped it the way it appeared before the audience.

It should be noted that such a creative approach to drama has long remained in disgrace from formidable critics. However, after World War II, the genre began to gain popularity. Its main ideologists are considered to be four masters of the word: E. Ionesco, S. Beckett, J. Jeunet and A. Adamov. Despite belonging to the same theatrical genre, each of them still had its own unique technique, which was more than the concept of "absurd". By the way, E. Ionesco himself did not accept the new term, saying “theater of ridicule” instead of “theater of the absurd”. But Esslin's definition, despite persistence and criticism, remained in art, and the genre gained popularity throughout the world.

Origins

Attempts to create a theater of the absurd were made long before the European wave in Russia, in the 1930s. Its idea belonged to the Association of Real Art (OBERIUTS), or rather, to Alexander Vvedensky. In a new genre, he wrote the plays "Minin and Pozharsky", "God is all around", "Christmas tree at the Ivanovs" and others. Daniil Kharms, a writer, poet and member of OBERIU, was his companion in writing.

In Russian drama of the late 20th century, the theater of the absurd can be seen in the plays of L. Petrushevskaya, V. Erofeev, and others.

Modernity

Today this theatrical genre is quite widespread. And, as a rule, the avant-garde phenomenon (as in its historical past) is associated with small (private) theaters. A striking example is the modern Theater of the Absurd by Gauguin Solntsev, a famous Russian freak artist. In addition to touring performances under the motto "Our whole life is theater", he gives lessons in acting, which, according to the author's opinion, are useful not only on stage, but also in everyday life.

Other theater groups exist and develop in this genre.

Sparrow

InArodny Theater of the Absurd "Sparrow" is one of the most popular troupes. It was created in 2012 in Kharkov. At first it was only a duet of Vasily Baidak (Uncle Vasya) and Alexander Serdyuk (Kollman). Today the Sparrow consists of six artists. All participants have higher education, but not acting. The name of the collective migrated from KVN. And the word "foreign" is deliberately misspelled. Posters and performances of "Sparrow" are always bright, not devoid of humor, farce and, of course, absurdity. The guys come up with all the plots of the performances themselves.

In music

The avant-garde genre is reflected not only in literature and performing arts, but also in music. So in 2010, the eighteenth studio album of the "Picnic" group, "Theater of the Absurd", was released.

The musical group was formed in 1978 and still exists. He began to work in the style of Russian rock and over time acquired an individual sound with the addition of symphonic keyboards and exotic instruments of the peoples of the world.

“Theater of the Absurd” is an album that opens with the composition of the same name. However, its text is devoid of comedy. Rather, on the contrary - the song has dramatic notes, saying that the whole world is a theater of the absurd, and the person in it is the main character.

The album also includes compositions with such interesting titles as "Doll with a Human Face", "Urim Tummim", "Wild Singer" (a reference to Ionesco's play "The Bald Singer" is read), "And the makeup will wash off." In general, the next creation of the "Picnic" group can be compared to a small theatrical performance with an original selection of images and themes.

In humor

One of the main features of the "illogical" genre is humor. This applies not only to the absurd heap of words, phrases of their play, but also the images themselves, which may appear at an unexpected time in an unexpected place. This tendency was more than used in the Theater of the Absurd issue by the comedy duo Demis Karibidis and Andrey Skorokhod - famous residents of the showComedy club ... It was based on the work of F.M. Dostoevsky's "Crime and Punishment", which was originally reinterpreted by the artists. The characters, the old money-lender (Demis Karibidis) and the student Rodion Raskolnikov (Andrey Skorokhod), in addition to the plot points, also touched upon modern economic, cultural and political realities.

Ticket number 24.

Features of the theater of the absurd: origins, representatives, features of the dramatic structure (S. Beckett, E. Ionesco).

Theater of the absurd - a trend in Western European drama and theater that arose in the middle of the 20th century. In absurd plays, the world is presented as a meaningless jumble of facts, deeds, words and destinies devoid of logic. The principles of absurdism were most fully embodied in the dramas The Bald Singer (1950) by the playwright Eugene Ionesco and Waiting for Godot by Samuel Beckett.

It is believed that theater of the absurd is rooted in the philosophy of Dadaism, poetry from non-existent words and avant-garde art of the 1910-20s. Despite sharp criticism, the genre gained in popularity after World War II, which pointed to the considerable uncertainty in human life. The introduced term has also been criticized, and there have been attempts to redefine it as "anti-theater" and "new theater". The “theater of the absurd” (or “new theater”) movement apparently originated in Paris as an avant-garde phenomenon associated with small theaters in the Latin Quarter, and after a while gained worldwide recognition.

In practice, theater of the absurd denies realistic characters, situations and all other relevant theatrical techniques. Time and place are indefinite and changeable, even the simplest causal relationships are destroyed. Pointless intrigues, repetitive dialogues and aimless chatter, dramatic inconsistency of actions - everything is subordinated to one goal: to create a fabulous, and maybe even terrible, mood.

The formation of the drama of the absurd was influenced by surreal theatricality: the use of bizarre costumes and masks, meaningless rhymes, provocative addresses to the audience, etc. The plot of the play, the behavior of the characters are incomprehensible, similar and sometimes designed to shock the audience. Reflecting the absurdity of mutual understanding, communication, dialogue, the play emphasizes in every possible way the lack of meaning in the language, and that, in the form of a kind of game without rules, becomes the main carrier of chaos.

For the absurdists, the dominant quality of being was not concise, but disintegration. The second significant difference from the previous drama is in relation to a person. A person in an absurd world is the personification of passivity and helplessness. He cannot be aware of anything except his own helplessness. He is deprived of freedom of choice. The absurdists have developed their own concept of drama - antidrama. The drama of the absurd is not a discussion of the absurd, but a demonstration of absurdity.

Eugene Ionesco - the pioneer of absurdism in French drama.

The situations, characters and dialogues of his plays follow the images and associations of dreams rather than everyday reality. Language, with the help of funny paradoxes, clichés, sayings and other word games, is freed from the usual meanings and associations. The surrealism of Ionesco's plays traces its origins to circus clownery, films by C. Chaplin, B. Keaton, the Marx brothers, ancient and medieval farce. A typical technique is a pile of objects that threaten to swallow the actors; things take on life, and people turn into inanimate objects. In the absurdist plays, catharsis is absent, E. Ionesco rejects any ideology, but the plays were brought to life by deep concern for the fate of the language and its speakers.

Premiere of "The Bald Singer" took place in Paris. The success of "The Bald Singer" was scandalous, no one understood anything, but watching absurdist plays gradually became good form.

When asked about the meaning of his drama, Ionesco replied that he wanted to “explain all the absurdity of existence, the separation of man from his transcendental roots,” to show that “when talking, people no longer know what they wanted to say, and that they were talking so that nothing to say that language, instead of bringing them closer together, only divides them even more ”, to reveal“ the unusual and strange nature of our existence ”and“ parade the theater, that is, the world ”.

The task of his drama is to create a fierce, unrestrained theater, he proposes to return to theatrical origins, namely to old puppet shows, in which caricatured improbable images are used, emphasizing the roughness of reality itself. Ionesco proclaimed a sharp disagreement with the existing theater, of all the playwrights he recognized only Shakespeare. Modern theater, in his opinion, is not capable of expressing the existential state of a person. Theater must move as far as possible from realism, which only obscures the essence of human life.

Beckett.

Beckett was Joyce's secretary and learned to write with him. “Waiting for Godot” is one of the basic texts of absurdism. Entropy is presented in a state of expectation, and this expectation is a process, the beginning and end of which we do not know, i.e. it makes no sense. The state of expectation is the dominant in which the heroes exist, while not wondering whether to wait for Godot. They are in a passive state.

Waiting for Godot.

Identification with Christ, the redeemer of human sins, with God the Father. "There is nothing more real than nothing." This is the symbol of Nothing. Nothing for existentialists comes with a plus sign. Central characters - Vladimir and Estragon, tramps. They are tired of waiting and cannot help but wait. A boy appears and announces that Godou's appearance has been delayed again. Lucky and Potso are figures, realists, pragmatists, they personify everyday vanity. Owner and E. have to eat pasture, they do not have a home, they spend the night in the open air. Lucky and Potso are surrounded by civilization items. But all the characters find in the process of existence only disease.

Vladimir and Estragon are distinguished by emasculated consciousness, they lack education, and Potso and Lucky even think on command. Vladimir and Estragon are friends, but they ask themselves if it is not better for them to live apart. Potso and Lucky also need each other. Different types of human and human development.

None of the options are paying off. Often the characters, if they are looking for something else, are on the other side of the border. Vladimir and Estragon love to look at their own things. They hope to find something there, but they find nothing. They don't try to create something on their own. To see in Nothing not only an expression of weakness, but also an expression of strength.

Beckett - Decline human nature... Ionesco - the decline of the human spirit.