Waiting for Godot

We're starting with Beckett's play tomorrow. Read it here or watch a film adaptation here. Recap of the slides on Beckett we saw today:

A scene from Happy Days

• The use of stark images of confinement: The woman half-buried in Happy Days; the actor strapped to the chair with only her mouth visible in Not I and so on.
• Also: Parents in drums in Endgame.

Martin Esslin came up with the term "Theatre of the Absurd." Marked by formal experimentation. A worldview of post-Nietzsche sensibilities - a godless universe. And the firm conviction that a godless universe is necessarily meaningless, "absurd". Communication therefore always breaks down into nonsensical rambling or utter silence (think of plays like Who's Afraid of Virginia Woolf). The presence of black humour. There are horrific, tragic scenes simultaneously staged with vaudevillian humour. Stark visual contrasts - heavy use of symbolism. More here.