Birthday parter as an absurd theatre

1. Name: Maru Riddhi
Paper: 9 The Modernist literature
Roll No: 21
Class: M.A.Sem.3
Year: 2016-2018
Emil Id: riddhimaru27@gmail.com
Submitted To: M.K.Bhavnagar University,
Department of English

2. 0. Born : 10th October, 1930
0. Profession : play writer,
Screenwriter, Actor, Theater
director, Poet
0. Nationality : British
0. Nobel Prize winner in 2005
0. His most Famous works : No
man’s Land, The Birthday Party,
Betrayal,
0. His career being with the play,
“The Room “
0.Died : 24th December, 2008

3. 0.It means the expression in art of the
meaninglessness of human existence.
0.‘Theatre of Absurd’ is a term or particular
movement started in Iate 1950.
0.Worid is without meaning and life is without
purpose.
0.Associated with Existentialism.
0.Samuel Beckett, Jean Genet, Tom Stoppard,
Friedrich Durrenmatt, Harold Pinter etc……

4. Critic Martin Esslin
coined the term“
Theatre of the
Absurd”in his 1960
essay and, later, a
book of the same
name. He related
these plays based on a
broad theme of the
Absard.

6. No Beginning
No End No Middle

7.  Broad Comedy
 menacing and tragic effect
 Alienation effect
 Hoplessness in Characters
 Fragmentations
 Parody of concept of “ well maid play”
 Unconventional writing
 Irrationality

8. Mainly it is found in the characters of Meg, Stanley
and Lulu.
“Meg: Stan! I'm coming up to fetch you if you
don't come down! I'm coming up! I'm going to
count three! One! Two! Three! I'm coming to get
you! (She exits and goes upstairs. In a moment,
shouts from STANLEY, wild laughter from MEG)”
“Meg: What are the cornflakes like, stanley?
Stanley: Horrible.” Broad Comedy

9. 0 .Frightening effect we find very much as it is “Comedy of Menace”
also.
0. In movie background sounds play vital role for it.
0. In movie we have many dialogues and scenes such as Blindmen’s
Buff scene( Menace) and Interrogation scene (tragic element).
0. Very much use of screaming and shouting in the play.
Menacing and
tragic effect
Life under the
Constant
Shadow of Fear
and Menace

10. 0.In almost every character we find a kind of
disappointment and complain from life.
0. Meg keeps on running meaningless
conversations like “how is cornflakes ?” or
“didn’t you enjoy your breakfast ?”etc. It is
perhaps to fill the emptiness within her.
0.And Petey’s indifferent silence.
0. Lulu’s frustration comes out when the
dialogue between her and Goldberg occurs.
Hopelessness and fragmentation in
characters.

11. Ambiguity and Mystery
Ambiguity and
Mystery Stanley’s
pastis so Mysterious
Goldberg and
McCann way of
asking questions
to Stanley
Kafka’s work
intensifies the
dreadful angst
experienced by the
protagonist