ABSTRACT
In 1938 Eugene Ionesco received a government grant to work in Paris on a thesis entitled ‘Themes of Sin and Death in French Literature since Baudelaire’. The famous controversy with Kenneth Tynan in 1958, shows the seriousness of Ionesco’s commitment to drama. R. N. Coe has called him ‘the most characteristic protagonist’ of the Absurd, and points out that in spite of a slender and uneven output he has been remarkably popular. If The Bald Prima Donna was the earlier play, it was Beckett’s Waiting for Godot that made the themes and method accessible on a world-wide scale. Admitting that Genet does display techniques and themes which invite the label, it is also true that reality keeps breaking through to offer a more ‘conventional type of theatrical experience in addition to the avant-garde challenge’. However Artaud’s influence worked, its effect is strongly felt, so much so that Brustein sees in Genet’s drama the only realization of Artaud’s ideas.
