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existentialist strain in the theatre of thje absurd
EXISTENTIAL STRAIN
IN
THE THEATRE OF THE ABSURD

Presented to:-
Prof: Salman Rafique
By: -
Khudija Bano
R.N - 12142014
The theatre of the Absurd is the term introduced by a renowned philosopher Martin Esslin in his book “The theatre of the absurd”. He used this term to refer to the work of certain playwrights who shared same philosophy about man’s existence in this earthly life. Among these playwrights the most prominent were Samuel Beckett, Eugenie Ionesco, Harold Pinter, Jean Genet and Adamov. The dramatists belonging to this theatre were all great innovators and they did such a wondering experiments, introducing a totally new kind of drama that differed from the traditional drama to such an extent that it rather shocked the audience. These writers portrayed human life having no meaning at all. This sense of meaning lessness is the outcome of the horrible effects of World War II. Rejecting traditional techniques of the drama, logical plots, witty dialogue, forceful characters, absurdist dramatist tried to depict modern man’s sense of alienation, hopelessness and that of reality being unreal. The theatre of the Absurd actually is mixture of many philosophical approaches or theories. It can be studied under surrealism, Dadasim, Nihilism and above all Existentialism. The theory of existentialism has a great impact on almost every writer belonging to the Absurd group. Before going to explore the existential strain in the theatre of the Absurd it is necessary to look at the origin or definition of the term existentialism. Existentialism is a philosophical approach developed in 1940 to 1950 Soren Kierkegaard was the first existentialist philosopher. Friedrich Nietzsche, Martin Heidegger, Karl Jaspears, Gabriel Marcel and Jean Paul Sartre were the writers who also came under the influence of existentialism. These writers though had different doctrinal approaches but they shared the same belief that human being is not a mere observer of the real

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