by Albert Camus (1944)

2022 reads, book 5/20:

The primary reason for reading this play was to complete what Albert Camus termed ‘The Cycle of the Absurd,’ a trio consisting of The Stranger, The Myth of Sisyphus, and Caligula. In this play, the Roman Emperor Caligula, after the death of his sister Drusilla, essentially goes mad and makes life a living hell for all of his constituents. This is the side of Caligula that those invested in Roman history are familiar with. But, in Camus’ version of events, Caligula suddenly obsesses over the impossible, wanting to “transcend God” and “truly be free” (it is truly unhinged behavior).

On the actual play: it wasn’t bad. It was definitely more violent than I expected (I guess I really shouldn’t have been surprised; the play is called Caligula after all). A good number of scenes are just Caligula getting someone to admit they should die, often through some faulty logic. There are interesting conversations happen between Caligula and Scipio, who seems to give Caligula a taste of his own medicine. This play probably had the most on-the-nose absurdist imagery, as there really is no plot to the play itself, it’s just a series of scenes used for philosophical debate.

What I did love was realizing the imagery in all of these works were connected. Caligula is obsessed with the impossible, as seen in the task he assigns one of his patrician: he wants the moon. In The Stranger, Meursault was obsessed with the sun, and of course Sisyphus had his boulder. Whether intentional or not, I was enamored by the symbolism provided by these three natural elements (sun, rock, and moon).

#readingyear2022 #absurdism #theatre

by Samuel Beckett (1952)

2022 reads, book 4/20:

“ESTRAGON: I can't go on like this. VLADIMIR: That's what you think.”

Although this play was famously described as one in which “nothing happens, twice,” any book or work that plays with the concept of time always piques my interest (this isn’t exclusive to time-travel). Time and memory are a large part in this play, but without spoiling, it only really works when you put together both acts. Act I was a bit boring, though it had some pretty funny dialogue, but reading the second half with the knowledge of the first half is a treat, because I wasn’t quite sure what to believe.

Quick sidenote: plays are meant to be seen in person, though, so I have a feeling that seeing this performed live (especially with Sir Ian McKellen and Sir Patrick Stewart) would turn this into a five-star play.

As a quick summary: the two titular characters, Estragon and Vladimir, are waiting for Godot, who is supposed to arrive soon. That’s all you need to know going into the play. With lots of references to absurdism and religion, you can really study this play as much as you want. On the surface level it works fine, and the conversations are actually pretty funny and witty, but as you read more into the dialogue and characters, you can really have fun with analyzing and speculating on what is truly going on.

“The tears of the world are a constant quantity. For each one who begins to weep somewhere else another stops. The same is true of the laugh.”

#readingyear2022 #absurdism #humor #physicallyowned #theatre

by Jean-Paul Sartre (1947)

2022 reads, book 1/20:

This book contains four plays of Jean-Paul Sartre, published between 1943 – 1947. I was most excited to read No Exit, but upon receiving this collection, I’ve read and compiled thoughts for all four plays in this edition below. I would rate the whole collection about 4 stars, but read on for the individual scores below.

No Exit (Huis Clos): A simple premise: three people, who didn’t know one another on Earth, arrive in hell. We, as the audience, simply watch (or read) the dialogue that ensues between them. What starts off a bit slow quickly ramps up to accusations being thrown, secrets being revealed, and true natures coming out at full force. I think it’s a great play, because not only is it a fun read at the surface level, but you can dig deeper into the meanings that Sartre hoped to communicate in this play, regarding freedom, acceptance from others and self-worth. 5/5 stars!

The Flies (Les Mouches): A retelling of the Greek tragedy Electra, which I was unfamiliar with before reading this. The main character Orestes returns to his home city, where he was kidnapped/rescued from as a child, as his father, the king, was murdered by his mother’s lover years earlier. He comes back and meets up with Electra, his sister who still lives there, to enact revenge. While the plot itself didn’t do much for me, the themes and motifs on religion, freedom, and guilt were interesting to dig into as I was reading. As a side note, the context in which Sartre wrote this was fascinating; it is said that he wrote this play to mirror the state of the German occupation of France, but in order to get it past Nazi censors, he disguised the plot into a Greek myth. Overall, 3/5 stars.

Dirty Hands (Les Mains sales): This one was a pretty fun read. It starts off in the future, where we learn that the main character Hugo just finished jail time for assassination of a political figure, and spend the rest of the play revisiting the events that led up to the assassination, to learn why he did it. The dialogue between the characters was witty, expertly written, and never felt dry. Not only was there substance, but the whole play even read like a comedy at times. 4/5 stars overall.

The Respectful Prostitute (La Putain respectueuse): Although it was short, this one was a rough. Set in the American south in the 1940s, this play explored not just racism, but power of the different political figures of that time. It was rough to read because of the vulgarity of the language, and the way that most, if not all, the characters acted throughout. Not only that, but the ending unfortunately was a bit unsatisfactory, so this gets 3/5 stars.

#readingyear2022 #physicallyowned #philosophy #theatre