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Understanding Absurdism in Literature

The document defines and discusses the absurdist literary movement. It emerged after World War II as a rebellion against traditional beliefs and assumptions about human rationality and order. Notable absurdist writers include Samuel Beckett, whose plays Waiting for Godot and Endgame exemplify the irrationality and absurdity of life. Other absurdist playwrights exploited absurdism for comic effects, while some living under totalitarian regimes used it for social and political protest. The absurdist movement emphasized the isolated human condition in an irrational universe without meaning.

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Divya Pavithran
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256 views10 pages

Understanding Absurdism in Literature

The document defines and discusses the absurdist literary movement. It emerged after World War II as a rebellion against traditional beliefs and assumptions about human rationality and order. Notable absurdist writers include Samuel Beckett, whose plays Waiting for Godot and Endgame exemplify the irrationality and absurdity of life. Other absurdist playwrights exploited absurdism for comic effects, while some living under totalitarian regimes used it for social and political protest. The absurdist movement emphasized the isolated human condition in an irrational universe without meaning.

Uploaded by

Divya Pavithran
Copyright
© © All Rights Reserved
We take content rights seriously. If you suspect this is your content, claim it here.
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Download as PPTX, PDF, TXT or read online on Scribd

Literary Terms

Absurd
Absurd
 Applied to a number of works in drama and prose fiction
 Common view that the human condition is essentially absurd , i.e. condition can be adequately
represented only in works of literature that are themselves absurd.
 Mood and dramaturgy of absurdity were anticipated in Alfred Jarry’s French play “Ubu roi” in
1896.
 Has its roots in the movements of expressionism and surrealism.
 Has its roots in the fiction of Franz Kafka (The Trial, Metamorphosis) in 1920s.
Absurd as a Movement
 The movement emerged in France after World War II (1939–45).
 It was a rebellion against basic beliefs and values in traditional culture and literature.
 Tradition had included the assumptions like : -
i. Human beings are fairly rational creatures
ii. Humans live in an at least partially intelligible universe
iii. Humans are part of an ordered social structure
iv. Humans may be capable of heroism and dignity even in defeat.
Movement after 1940s
 Existential philosophy of men
 Letters of Jean-Paul Sartre and Albert Camus bring out viewpoint : -
i. A human being as an isolated existent who is cast into an alien universe.
ii. To conceive the human world as possessing no inherent truth, value, or meaning;
iii. To represent human life as an existence which is both anguished and absurd.
Samuel Beckett -as an Absurd Playwright

 Samuel Beckett (1906–89),


 The most eminent and influential writer in drama and in prose fiction.
 An Irishman living in Paris
 Writes in French and then translated his works into English.
 Famous plays of Beckett : -
i. Waiting for Godot (1954)
ii. Endgame (1958)
 The above examples project the irrationalism, helplessness, and absurdity of life in dramatic forms
that reject realistic settings.
Samuel Beckett as an Absurd Playwright
 Beckett presents an antihero who plays out the absurd moves of the end game of civilization in a
non work which tends to undermine the coherence of its medium, language itself.
 Beckett’s characters carry on, even if in a life without purpose, trying to make sense of the
senseless and to communicate the uncommunicable.
 Examples of such prose fictionare :
i. Malone Dies (1958)
ii. The Unnamable (1960)
Absurd Playwrights
 French playwright of the absurd was Jean Genet
 Jean combined absurdism and diabolism
 Dramatic works of the Englishman Harold Pinter and the American Edward Albee are written in
a similar mode.
 The early plays of Tom Stoppard, such as Rosencrantz and Guildenstern Are Dead (1966) and
Travesties (1974).
 All the above examples exploit the devices of absurdist theater more for comic than philosophical
ends.
Tragic Farce

 Consist of baleful, naive, or inept characters.


 Set up in a fantastic or nightmarish modern world play
 Events are often simultaneously comic, horrifying, and absurd.
 Examples:
a) Joseph Heller’s Catch-22 (1961)
b) Thomas Pynchon’s V (1963)
c) John Irving’s The World According to Garp (1978)
Black comedy/humor in Absurd Movement

 Absurdist movement also exploit black comedy or black humor


 Example of Novelists that exploits Black comedy/humour are : -
a) Novels by Günter Grass (German)
b) Novels by Kurt Vonnegut and John Barth (Americans)
 Example of black comedy in the cinema : -
a) Stanley Kubrick’s Dr. Strangelove (1964)
Totalitarian Absurdists
 Some playwrights living in totalitarian regimes used absurdist techniques to register social and
political protest.
 Example:
a. Largo Desolato (1987) by the Czech Václav Havel
b. The Island (1973) - a collaboration by the South African writers Athol Fugard, John Kani, and
Winston Ntshona.

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