https://www.washingtontimes.com/news/2022/jul/20/living-in-a-leftist-fantasy-is-a-contemporary-thea/Living in a leftist fantasy is a contemporary theatre of the absurd
By Gerard LevalJuly 20, 2022
In mid-20th century France, there developed a school of writing which was sometimes called the Theatre of the Absurd. With roots in the impressionist movement of the early 20th century and affiliated with existentialist philosophy, this school of writing sprang out of the turmoil of the post-World War II era.
Various playwrights became exponents of this movement. Perhaps the most famous was Eugene Ionesco, a Romanian-born Frenchman whose life was rendered difficult as he navigated his way between the land of his birth and his adopted homeland during times of horrible conflict.
Underlying the literature that characterized the Theatre of the Absurd was the seeming futility of ordinary life. Considering the mass murders and suffering that had been inflicted on Europe’s population during World War II, this post-war sense of hopelessness is quite understandable.
In this spirit, Eugene Ionesco’s most famous play, “The Bald Soprano,” turns reality on its head. Every normal expectation is inverted, with ordinary social conventions and assumptions being transformed and ridiculed.
In one of the scenes of “The Bald Soprano,” we witness a couple sitting in the living room of their London apartment when suddenly the doorbell rings. The woman goes to the door and opens it, but no one is there. The audience knows that the individual who just rang is hiding in the hallway to elude the woman who opened the door. The woman returns to the table informing her husband that there was no one at the door. The doorbell rings again and once more, when the woman opens the door, no one is there. This process repeats itself multiple times. After the third of these episodes, the woman tells her husband that she can now conclude that, whenever a doorbell rings, there is never anyone at the door.
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