Theatre of The Absurd When Tragic Turns

Πάπυροι - Επιστημονικό Περιοδικό Papyri - Scientific Journal
τόμος 5, 2016 volume 5, 2016

www.academy.edu.gr papyri@academy.edu.gr
Theatre of the absurd: When tragic turns into absurd through irony
STELLA KOULANDROU, National Kapodistrian University of Athens

E-mail: stkoulan@otenet.gr
Περίληψη
Η κατάσταση μετά τον Β΄ Παγκόσμιο Πόλεμο προκάλεσε την ολοκληρωτική αλλαγή του τρόπου σκέψης
και του τρόπου διαβίωσης. Η τραγωδία –στη γνώριμη μορφή της– δεν μπορεί να επιβιώσει σε εποχή κατά την
οποία ο ηρωισμός, τα έντονα συναισθήματα και οι ωραίες λέξεις βυθίζονται στο αίμα και τη νοθεία. Είναι δύ-
σκολο κάποιο λογοτεχνικό είδος τόσο λογικά και αρμονικά δομημένο να επιβιώσει στην κοινωνία εκείνη που
θέτει τα πάντα υπό αμφισβήτηση: τη λογική συνοχή, τις αξίες, το νόημα, την ίδια την ύπαρξη. Η καταστροφή
πλέον έγινε πολύ κοινή και συνηθισμένη υπόθεση, ώστε να παρουσιαστεί με τρόπο που να επιτρέπει και κάποια
εναλλακτική λύση. Ωστόσο, το γενικευμένο κλίμα τρόμου, πανικού και εκφοβισμού, μετά τον πόλεμο, έδωσε την
αφορμή για την ανανεωτική προσέγγιση του τραγικού. Το άρθρο εξετάζει τον τρόπο με τον οποίον η σύγχρονη
τραγωδία εμφανίζεται από κάποιον απροσδόκητο χώρο και προσλαμβάνει διαφορετική μορφή και λειτουργι-
κότητα: Η σύγχρονη τραγωδία δεν εμφανίζεται από εκεί που θα περιμέναμε –από τον κόσμο των ηρώων 10 και
των θεών– αλλά από την αντίθετη πλευρά, καθώς προέρχεται πλέον από τον χώρο του κωμικού και ειδικότερα
από την «κατώτερη» μορφή του κωμικού: την παρωδία, τη φάρσα, την ειρωνεία. Το θέατρο του παραλόγου εί-
ναι η σύγχρονη αντι-τραγωδία, καθώς παρουσιάζει τον τραγικό κόσμο ανεστραμμένο: από τον «εξαιρετικό»
τραγικό ήρωα καταλήγουμε στον συνηθισμένο ή και υποδεέστερο του συνηθισμένου αντι-ήρωα του θεάτρου
του παραλόγου, από τον λογικό ειρμό στο γκροτέσκο, από την ποιητική γλώσσα σε κλισέ και σλόγκαν ή σπα-
σμωδικούς ήχους, από την πίστη στη θεϊκή δικαιοσύνη στην αίσθηση κάποιας ανεξήγητης δυστυχίας, κάποιας
υποταγής στην κακοβουλία ενός ανελέητου όντος. Η σύγχρονη τραγωδία περισσότερο από οτιδήποτε άλλο
απορρίπτει το «μεγαλειώδες» της αρχαίας˙ στη θέση του, παραθέτει το μαύρο χιούμορ, το οποίο λειτουργεί
εντούτοις με τον ίδιο τρόπο, δηλαδή καταδεικνύει τη συμφορά, τον θρήνο, τον παραλογισμό.
Λέξεις-Κλειδιά: Tραγικό, Παράλογο, Αρχαία ελληνική τραγωδία, Θέατρο του παραλόγου, Ειρωνεία
Abstract
The situation after the World War II caused the complete change of the way of thinking and the way of
living. Tragedy –with the known form– cannot survive in an era when the heroism, the great feelings and the
great words had been sinked in blood and lie. It is difficult for a literary kind so formal to survive in a society who
calls everything into question: the coherence, the values, the meaning, the extistence itself. Disaster became more
casual and commonplace to portray it in ways which imply an alternative. However, the generalized climate of
fear, panic and terrorism after the war was the reason for a renewed attention to the tragic. The article examines
the ways in which modern tragedy appears from an unexpected space and with other form and other function:
Modern tragedy does not come back from where we waited it, where we were looking for it –in the world of he-
roes and gods– but from the opposite side, as it is in comic where it finds its origin and especially in the inferior
form of comic: parody, farce, irony. Theatre of the absurd is the modern anti-tragedy, as it presents the tragic
world inverted: from the exceptional ancient hero we are leading to the usual or less inferior than usual anti-
hero of theatre of the absurd, from the logical structure to the grotesque, from the poetic and logical language to
liché and slogan, or words reduced to pure agglomerates of sound, from the faith to the divine justice to the
sense of an inexplicable unhappiness, of the submission on the malevolence of some pitiless being. Modern trag-
edy most of all despises the “grandeur” of ancient tragedy. In its place it puts dark humour, which works in the
same way, remarking the disaster, the lamentation, the absurdity.
Keywords: Tragic, Absurd, Greek tragedy, Theatre of the absurd, Irony
64
ISSN: 2241-5106
τόμος 5, 2016 volume 5, 2016
As Walter Kaufmann argues, after the images of the World War II, we cannot make so much
“fuss” about Oedipus or Hippolytus anymore.1 It is very difficult for tragedy to survive in an era when
the heroism, the great feelings and the great words had just been sinked in blood and lie. The situation
after the war caused the complete change of the way of thinking and the way of living. The atomic
bomb managed to deconstruct the reality; nothing was the same anymore. At the “decisive” times of
History, the art needs a “new language” to express itself. A literary kind so formal, with so many rules,
it is difficult to survive in a society who rejects the taboos and calls into question the coherence and
the values.2
From the ashes of the war had jumped out suddenly a person broken into fragments, the in-
dustrialization gave birth to the wandering mass. People’s position in the world had radically changed
with technology, which had dismissed magic and mystery, very important elements of tragedy. 3 How-
ever, the most important element of tragedy which the modern world had dismissed is the divine faith.
Freddy Decreus wonders if we are living in post-tragic times, after the big conflicts, in post-ideological
times, bereft of all synoptic visions or is the generalized climate of fear, panic and terrorism once again
the reason for a renewed attention to the tragic.4 Many scholars think that god’s “death” is being fol-
lowed by tragedy’s “death”; absence of god, absence of “severe” theatre; despite our efforts, the place
of myth remains empty in the contemporary dramaturgy.5
Theatre of the absurd: Modern tragicomedy

Nevertheless, modern tragedy is alive. Everything depends on the definition of the “tragic”: We
could say that tragic is the consciousness of human’s crushing and tragic is the crushing which arises
from the consciousness of the disproportion between human and world; the absolute loneliness, the
consciousness of the absolute wilderness in time and in space is the essence of tragic. 6 Ion Omesco be-
lieves that theatre of the absurd is the contemporary “metamorphosis” of ancient greek tragedy. Jean-
Marie Domenach, in his turn, believes that tragedy’s “renaissance” happened through theatre of the
absurd.
Modern tragedy does not come back from where we waited it, where we were looking for it –in
the world of heroes and gods– but from the opposite side, as it is in comic where it finds its origin and
especially in the inferior form of comic: parody, farce, irony. It is true that we find the tragic feeling
between the anonymous, the “nobodies”, the weaks, the paralysed persons of Eugène Ionesco and
Samuel Beckett. Consequently, theatre of the absurd is the modern anti-tragedy, as it presents the
tragic world but inverted. Modern tragedy most of all despises the “grandeur”, the magnificence of an-
cient tragedy. In its place it puts dark humour, which works in the same way, remarking the disaster,
the lamentation, the absurdity. So, it is the magnificence that died and not the tragedy itself. 7
Irony as the basic element of theatre of the absurd

Theatre of the absurd demonstrates the unhappiness on distance, through irony. Its means are
over-imaginative: fantasy, grotesque, clowning, exaggeration, dream, illusion, parable, parody. Eugène
Ionesco describes the new theatre form: it should reach the edge of grotesque, of caricature; humour,
yes, but using the methods of burlesque; comic effects that are firm, broad and outrageous; the new
theatre should push everything on the paroxysm, where the source of the tragic lies.8 Theatre of the
absurd, the modern tragicomedy, is the final breakdown of the classical separation of high and low
styles. It underlines the coexistence of amusement and pity, terror and laugher.9 It calls into question
every convention– even the conventions of the theatre.
Heroes
The ancient tragic hero is covered with the “magnificence”; ancient tragedy believes in hu-
man’s worth, it does not tolerate the “petty”.10 The loss of the heroes’ moral stature and the contrast
65
ISSN: 2241-5106
τόμος 5, 2016 volume 5, 2016
with the myth was the only way for tragedy to be born again. As modern heroes lack more and more
the sources of wealth and power, as they move down the social order, their tragic stature starts to di-
minish. The heroes of theatre of the absurd have little wealth, few possessions and no cultural capital.
Their lives are lived in a state of “bewilderment”, as if they are playing out a game whose rules they do
not invent and understand, a game that none of them will win. They are largely “nobodies” in an “un-
knowable” world.11 The disablement is presented as a normal situation; it is not explained: “Pozzo:
One day, is that not enough for you, one day like any other day, one day he went dumb, one day I went
blind, one day we’ll go deaf, one day we were born, one day we shall die, the same day the same sec-
ond, is that enough for you?”.12
Consequently, from the exceptional ancient hero13 we are leading to the usual or less inferior
than usual anti-hero of theatre of the absurd.14 The anti-hero does not communicate with the world.
He lives sometimes in the country, sometimes in an undefinite place, buried in the sand– and wastes
his time watching his objects or inventing silly activities. It is not about human characters anymore,
but about the “personification” of some situations (pain, boredom, loneliness, impasse). It is about
people without name, without face, without existence. “Nobody ever recognizes us”, admits Vladimir,
while he feels the need to be confirmed, somebody to assure him that he is alive: “Tell him... tell him
you shaw us. You did see us, didn’t you?”.15 It is about alive-dead, person with only physical existence.
Mrs Rooney in All that fall says: “Don’t mind me. Don’t take any notice of me. I do not exist. The fact is
well known”; Mr Tyler cries: “What sky! What light! Ah in spite of all it is a blessed thing to be alive in
such weather, and out of hospital”; Mrs Rooney wonders: “Alive? -Mr Tyler: Well half alive shall we
say? Mrs Rooney: Speak for yourself, Mr Tyler. Iam not half alive nor anything approaching it”. 16
The “non-existence” is revealed through the impotence of communication. The anti-heroes of
the absurd, while they have –physically– other people nearby, experience the absolute loneliness: no-
body understands nobody, nobody communicates with nobody. The same is happening somehow, cer-
tainly, with the exceptional ancient tragic heroes, who do not make sometimes themselves understood
to the “common men”.17 The lack of understanding, however, is the consequence of the spiritual differ-
ence; in theatre of the absurd, on the contrary, the lack of understanding is deeper and is due to the
lack of “logos”. Winnie is clear: “One does not appear to be asking a great deal, indeed at times it would
seem hardly possible – to ask less – of a fellow-creature – to put it mildly – whereas actually – when
you think about it – look into your heart – see the other – what he needs – peace – to be left in peace –
then perhaps the moon – all this time – asking for the moon”.18 The impotence of communication is
presented as a natural illness of the human being.
Means
Theatre of the absurd utilizes the “technique of shock”. These plays do not have a structure, a
logical evolution; the same pointless activities are being repeated; people are immobile and attempt –
in vain– to communicate, to transmit a “message”, which always remains unreasonable, because of the
loss of “logos” (with both meanings: speach and reason). Estragon confirms: “Nothing happens, no-
body comes, nobody goes, it’s awful!”.19 As Ionesco says, if our world is one in which people strike us
as inhuman, then let us place robots on the stage. If we feel that the physical aspects of life deny us the
full development of our spiritual potential, then by all means let that be reflected in a play whose décor
or properties slowly dominate the characters. If language is worn out, then let us show the solidified
forms of that language as cliché and slogan, or words reduced to pure agglomerates of sound.20
In theatre of the absurd, we find the world disfigured: we watch grotesque creature on stage,
super-natural beings, we become witnesses of the multiplication of objects, in front of us humans turn
into animals. Theatre of the absurd denies reason, order, modest behaviour, even language; it attempts
to show their ineffectiveness. Everything is being treated by irony: familly relationship ( The Chairs,
Jack or the submission, Amédée or How to get rid of it), erotic relationship (The Lesson), communica-
tion (The bald Soprano), capability of understanding (The bald Soprano, Waiting for Godot). Mean-
66
ISSN: 2241-5106
τόμος 5, 2016 volume 5, 2016
while, behind irony and parody is hiding the most bitter tragedy. Tragic and comic coexist, in the end,
however, what is remaining is tragic, this sense of nihilism, of lack of meaning, this sense of the absurd.
Fate
Vladimir wonders “suppose we repented”, while Estragon answers “our being born?”. 21 At diffi-
cult times, people usually doubt about the existence of a supreme being who governs –logically– the
universe. This doubt is already shown in Euripides’ tragedy, in the era of the hardest civil war. 22 In al-
most all the plays of theatre of the absurd is being provoked the sense of an inexplicable unhappiness,
of the submission on the malevolence of some pitiless being: “Estragon: Do you think God sees me? -
Vladimir: You must close your eyes. -Estragon: God have pity on me! -Vladimir: And me? -Estragon: On
me! On me! Pity! On me!”;23 but the life’s governor does not answer, for not betraying his non-exist-
ence. Winnie, in her turn, notices: “How can one better magnify the Almighty than by sniggering with
him at his little jokes, particularly the poorer one?”.24
The modern fate is this resignation to the absurdity. Vladimir objects: “To every man his little
cross. Till he dies. And is forgotten”.25 Winnie admits: “Just can’t be cured – cannot be cured – no worse
– no better, no worse – no change – no pain – no zest – for anything – no interest – in life”; sometimes
she appeals to the divine help: “good God!”; she hopes that her prayers are “perhaps not for naught”;
she tries not to “complain”; she glorifies “the fleeting joys”, but then she remembers “the something
lasting woe”; and she concludes that “this is going to be another happy day!”.26 The modern fate is the
acceptance of the swamp. The mouldy house is drowning Jean in Hunger and Thirst, while Marie-Mad-
eleine objects: “Afterwards, if this is the common fate, we have to accept it... Most people live in this
way, in houses like this”.27 Μadeleine in Amédée or How to get rid of it underlines that the reason of
their unhappiness is Amédée’s lack of initiative.28 Hamm in Beckett’s Endgame wonders anxiously
“what’s happening” and Clov answers that simply “something is taking its course”. The unhappiness
seems prearranged. Hamm admits: “I was never there... Absent, always. It all happened without me”.29
Even when the anti-heroes find the opportunity to react, they are so reassured that they man-
age to ruin every possibility of change: In The Chairs, the old couple is panicked when the “ceremony”
begins; in Amédée or How to get rid of it, the arrival of the postman, the “threat” that after all this iso-
lation the “world” will come into their life, make them anxious: “Who do you think we are for receiving
letters?”.30 The lack of communication is what makes the impasse harder. Amédée notices: “You know,
Madeleine, if we really loved each other, all these would not have any importance. Let’s love each
other, Madeleine, I beg you. You know, love manages everything, it changes life”, while Madeleine ob-
jects that: “It is not love that can free people from life’s trouble! He is all these. It is his world, not
ours”.31 The unhappiness is now monstrous and people paralyse in front of it.
Modern tragedy is tragedy of immobility, of inactivity. It could be said that the terms are in-
verted: the fate is movable and the modern tragic hero is immobile; his only “movement” is to be sub-
mited to the absurdity: “Winnie: No, here all is strange. Thankful for it in any case. Most thankful. Bow
and raise the head, bow and raise, always that”;32 “Madeleine: You call this life... Amédée: All these, it is
fate”.33 Even at the most comic and ironical times, some kind of fate smoulders, which arranges human
matters. To the question “what time is it”, the answer is “the same as usual”.34 In ancient tragedy are
fighting “presences”: persons, values, meanings– in anti-tragedy are fighting “absences”: absence of
face, of value, of meaning.
The old man in Ionesco’s The Chairs wonders: “What’s left? Pain, sorrow, remorse, nothing
else...”.35 We could say that in these words is condensed the main worldview of theatre of the absurd:
the human being came to the earth for suffering. In theatre of the absurd it is not death that stops the
time, it is life itself. It is a severely bleak version of play as fate. Environment is no longer clear, tangi-
ble or rationally accessible. It is replaced by an inscrutable fate in which intention seems severed from
human action, in which causality has been replaced by the randomness of chance. Yet without being
environmental in the naturalist sense, or supernatural in the religious sense, fate still is an external
67
ISSN: 2241-5106
τόμος 5, 2016 volume 5, 2016
force, the external something that determines human action but has no public face, no visible emana-
tion. No longer in the lap of the gods, it is dispersed amidst the being of a profane world. 36
Conclusion: Comic is more painful –and more “serious”– than tragic

From this “puppetshow”, this “clownerie”, consequently, arises modern tragic, which is based
on irony and parody. Tragic is not at heaven anymore; it is not between values, in an era when every-
thing is in doubt. It is on the earth, between common people: “Pozzo: That’s how it is on this bitch of an
earth. -Estragon: So long as one knows. -Vladimir: One can bide one’s time. Estragon: One knows what
to expect. -Vladimir: No further need to worry. -Estragon: Simply wait. -Vladimir: We’re used to it”.37
George Steiner proclaimed that when god is dead, tragedy is also dead.38 Nevertheless, the
tragic feeling is never absent from human life, the ways that it is being expressed is what change from
time to time. Irony, parody and absurd, that ancient tragedy uses up to a point,39 are the basic ele-
ments of modern tragedy. Theatre of the absurd is the modern anti-tragedy; a tragedy with different
view and different worldview. A tragicomedy which presents the lack, the absence, the emptiness; it
demonstrates the anti-values, the anti-meanings, the anti-feelings. The tragic in theatre of the absurd is
the metaphysical agony for the lack of meaning.
If at first absurd and tragic seem contraries, both of them, in fact, arise from the same view on
human situation. Tragic and comic-absurd are supplement; they are the recto and the verso of the
same problem. The society of the twentieth century, sinked in loneliness, insecurity and uncertainty,
seems more “tragic” than every other society, tragic even without god– or maybe thanks to the lack of
god. In the “century of logic” people come out more “absurd” than ever and less “main” of themselves
than ever. If there is a modern “Nemesis”, we could say that is the modern life itself, which is taking
revenge –even on “innocents”– turning itself into alive death.
68
ISSN: 2241-5106
τόμος 5, 2016 volume 5, 2016
1 Walter Kaufmann, Tragedy and Philosophy, University Press, Princeton 1992, p. XX.
2 Terry Eagleton wonders who can be a hero in a nuclear age, in an era when disaster is too casual and
commonplace for us to portray it in ways which imply an alternative. As an aristocrat among arts
forms, tragedy’s tone is too solemn and portentous for a streetwise and sceptical culture (Sweet
Violence: The idea of the Tragic, Blackwell, Oxford 2003, p. 64, 94, IX).
3 Jean-Marie Domenach, Le retour du tragique, Éditions du Seuil, Paris 1967, p. 254.
4 Freddy Decreus, Can greek tragedy, when staged in an open dramaturgical style, still be tragic? ,
Theatre and theatre studies in the 21st century, Ed. Anna Tabaki – Walter Puchner, First International
Conference, 28.9-1.10.2005, National and Kapodistrian University of Athens, Ergo, Athens 2010, p.
252.
5 Ion Omesco, La métamorphose de la tragédie, PUF, Paris 1978, p. 14.
6 Christos Malevitsis, On the tragic, Αstrolavos/Εfthini, Athens 1986, p. 27-30.
7 Stella Koulandrou, Modern anti-tragedy: Theatre of the absurd, The reception of greek tragedy in
contemporary french drama, PhD Thesis, University of Athens, Faculty of Theatre Studies, School of
Philosophy, 2012, p. 82-96.
8 Eugène Ionesco, Notes and Counter-Notes, Tr. D. Watson, J. Calder, London 1964, p. 24.
9 John Orr, Modernism and Tragicomedy, Tragicomedy and contemporary culture: Play and
performance from Beckett to Shepard, Palgrave, New York 1991, p. 1.
10 Very characteristic is the stasimon of Sophocle’s Antigone (332-374), which refers to the man’s
value: “Chorus: Many things are formidable, and none more formidable than man! He crosses the gray
sea beneath the winter wind, passing beneath the surges that surround him; and he wears away the
highest of the gods, Earth, immortal and unwearying, as his ploughs go back and forth from year to
year, turning the soil with the aid of the breed of horses. And he captures the tribe of thoughtless birds
and the races of wild beasts and the watery brood of the sea, catching them in the woven coils of nets,
man the skilful. And he contrives to overcome the beast that roams the mountain, and tames the
shaggy-maned horse and the untiring mountain bull, putting a yoke about their necks. And he has
learned speech and wind-swift thought and the temper that rules cities, and how to escape the
exposure of the inhospitable hills and the sharp arrows of the rain, all-resourceful; he meets nothing in
the future without resource; only from Hades shall he apply no means of flight; and he has contrived
escape from desperate maladies. Skilful beyond hope is the contrivance of his art, and he advances
sometimes to evil, at other times to good. When he applies the laws of the earth and the justice the
gods have sworn to uphold he is high in the city; outcast from the city is he with whom the ignoble
consorts for the sake of gain. May he who does such things never sit by my hearth or share my
thoughts!” (Sophocles, vol. II, Ed. Tr. H. Lloyd-Jones, The Loeb Classical Library, Harvard University
Press, London 1994).
11 John Orr, Modernism and Tragicomedy, p. 2.
12 Samuel Beckett, Waiting for Godot, The complete dramatic works, Faber and Faber, London 1990,
p. 83.
13 It goes without saying that the tragic heroes are not “flawless” and that their extreme delinquent
behavior is not “blameless”. However, the “hero-problem”, according to Jean-Pierre Vernant (The
historical moment of tragedy in Greece: Some social and psychological conditions, Myth and Tragedy
in Ancient Greece I, Zaharopoulos, Athens 1988, p. 19), fits into a different order, where the evaluation
is done with different standards.
14 Emmanuel Jacquart argues that “le surhumain cède le pas au subhumain” (the superhuman gives
his place to the subhuman) (Le théâtre de dérision, Gallimard, Paris 1974, p. 117).
15 Samuel Beckett, Waiting for Godot, p. 47, 50.
16 Samuel Beckett, All that fall, p. 179, 175-176.
17 Especially in the sophoclean and in the euripidean tragedy, it is very typical the view of an absolute
hero who cannot make himself (his absolute passion, his firm ideal, his inflexible determination)
understood to the “moderate” chorus or to the nurses, who try ‒in vain‒ to make him “reasonable”
(typical are the cases of Antigone, Oedipus, Medea, Phaedra).
69
ISSN: 2241-5106
τόμος 5, 2016 volume 5, 2016
18 Samuel Beckett, Happy Days, p. 149.

19 Samuel Beckett, Waiting for Godot, p. 41.
20 Arnold Hinchliffe, The Absurd, Methuen, London 1969, p. 61.
22 Oedipus cries out: “O fate, how miserable you have made me from the start, how wretched if any
man ever was! Even before I came forth into the light from my mother’s womb and was still unborn
Apollo prophesied to Laius that I would be my father’s murderer: O the misery!” (Euripides,
Phoenician Women, 1595-1599, vol. V, Ed. Tr. D. Kovacs, The Loeb Classical Library, Harvard
University Press, London 2002); the chorus leader in Iphigenia at Aulis marks: “Yet ill is the fate the
gods have sent you” (1403, vol. VI, Ed. Tr. D. Kovacs, The Loeb Classical Library, Harvard University
Press, London 2002); Orestes in Iphigenia among the Taurians says: “And the gods, who are called
wise, are no more truthful than winged dreams. There is much confusion in the divine and in the
mortal realm” (570-573, vol. IV, Ed. Tr. D. Kovacs, The Loeb Classical Library, Harvard University
Press, London 1999).
26 Samuel Beckett, Happy Days, p. 138-142.
27 Eugène Ionesco, La soif et la faim, Théâtre IV, Gallimard, Paris 1986, p. 79. The translation is mine.
28 Eugène Ionesco, Amédée ou Comment s’en débarrasser, Théâtre I, Gallimard, Paris 1994, p. 252.
29 Samuel Beckett, Endgame, p. 98, 128.
30 Eugène Ionesco, Amédée ou Comment s’en débarrasser, p. 238.
31 Ibid., p. 268.
33 Eugène Ionesco, Amédée ou Comment s’en débarrasser, p. 251.
34 Samuel Beckett, Endgame, p. 94.
35 Eugène Ionesco, Les Chaises: Farce tragique, Théâtre II, Gallimard, Paris 1995, p. 31.
36 John Orr, Modernism and Tragicomedy, p. 7.
38 George Steiner, The death of tragedy, Faber and Faber, London 1963, p. 353.
39 It is well known the sophoclean “tragic irony”, where the audience knows something that the main
hero ignores (Oedipus); equally known is Euripides’ ironic perspective at his heroes (especially in the
“antiwar” plays) and at god.
70
ISSN: 2241-5106
τόμος 5, 2016 volume 5, 2016
Βιβλιογραφία
Plays
Beckett, Samuel, The complete dramatic works, Faber and Faber, London 1990.
Ionesco, Eugène, Théâtre I, Gallimard, Paris 1994.
Ionesco, Eugène, Théâtre II, Gallimard, Paris 1995.
Ionesco, Eugène, Théâtre IV, Gallimard, Paris 1986.
Essays
Decreus, Freddy, Can greek tragedy, when staged in an open dramaturgical style, still be tragic?,
Theatre and theatre studies in the 21st century, Ed. Anna Tabaki – Walter Puchner, First International
Conference, 28.9-1.10.2005, National and Kapodistrian University of Athens, Ergo, Athens 2010.
Domenach, Jean-Marie, Le retour du tragique, Éditions du Seuil, Paris 1967.
Eagleton, Terry, Sweet Violence: The idea of the Tragic, Blackwell, Oxford 2003.
Hinchliffe, Arnold, The Absurd, Methuen, London 1969.
Ionesco, Eugène, Notes and Counter-Notes, Tr. D. Watson, J. Calder, London 1964.
Jacquart, Emmanuel, Le théâtre de dérision, Gallimard, Paris 1974.
Kaufmann, Walter, Tragedy and Philosophy, University Press, Princeton 1992.
Koulandrou, Stella, Modern anti-tragedy: Theatre of the absurd, The reception of greek tragedy in
contemporary french drama, PhD Thesis, University of Athens, Faculty of Theatre Studies, School of
Philosophy, 2012.
Malevitsis, Christos, On the tragic, Αstrolavos/Εfthini, Athens 1986.
Omesco, Ion, La métamorphose de la tragédie, PUF, Paris 1978.
Orr, John, Modernism and Tragicomedy, Tragicomedy and contemporary culture: Play and
performance from Beckett to Shepard, Palgrave, New York 1991.
Steiner, George, The death of tragedy, Faber and Faber, London 1963.
Vernant, Jean-Pierre, The historical moment of tragedy in Greece: Some social and psychological
conditions, Myth and Tragedy in Ancient Greece I, Zaharopoulos, Athens 1988.
71
ISSN: 2241-5106

Theatre of The Absurd When Tragic Turns

Uploaded by

Copyright:

Available Formats

You might also like

Theatre of The Absurd When Tragic Turns

Uploaded by

Document Information

Original Title

Copyright

Available Formats

Share this document

Share or Embed Document

Sharing Options

Did you find this document useful?

Is this content inappropriate?

Copyright:

Available Formats

Theatre of The Absurd When Tragic Turns

Uploaded by

Copyright:

Available Formats

Πάπυροι - Επιστημονικό Περιοδικό Papyri - Scientific Journal

τόμος 5, 2016 volume 5, 2016

STELLA KOULANDROU, National Kapodistrian University of Athens

Keywords: Tragic, Absurd, Greek tragedy, Theatre of the absurd, Irony

Theatre of the absurd: Modern tragicomedy

Irony as the basic element of theatre of the absurd

Conclusion: Comic is more painful –and more “serious”– than tragic

18 Samuel Beckett, Happy Days, p. 149.

You might also like