Eugène Ionesco (1909–1994)

You can only get so much from simply reading these plays, you need to bring you visualisation skills because they are all presented with a riot of noises, movement, visual symbols, slapstick comedy and action. The famous 'Rhinoceros' can be seen as a wonderfully comical statement about the frightening rise of fanaticism, but the common thread of all three plays is the maddening lack of communication between people. Berenger cannot communicate with his friend Jean (Rhinoceros), the old couple show more talk in a kind of stream of consciousness nonsense to each other (the Chairs), and the Professor and his pupil's relationship doesn't go all that well, to say the least, in 'the Lesson'. Ionesco is much more fun than Beckett, but Iike Beckett, these works enquire deeply into what it means to be human. Even if you never get to see a good production, you must at least read these and imagine! show less

"La cantatrice chauve": Perfectly absurd: hilarious!

"La leçon": Yes, it's a lesson, a pure one like "Waltz with Bachir". The whole story, you're laughing at the absurdity, the non-sense. It's as hilarious as "Waltz with Bachir" is beautifully drawn. So you're just enjoying it, without for a second thinking to what is expecting you at the end, i.e. the horror. Here the nazi horror, and the horror of its accomplices supporting the system without an ounce of guilt because they were convincing show more themselves of just doing what they were told to.
It's just brilliant. show less

review of
Eugène Ionesco's Three Plays
by tENTATIVELY, a cONVENIENCE - October 27, 2012

Why, it's practically sinful, a shame, a horror of sorts that I'm only now getting around to reading Ionesco after having known about his work for 30 or 40 yrs. Sure, sure, I can make excuses: 'I don't like reading plays', 'I prefer reading works by the originators like Jarry' & that sort of rot but, truth be told, Ionesco is now my favorite playwright (at least for today) & that's saying alot. [plane show more flies thru the review unnoticed by the reviewer]

In my life, I haven't been much of a theater-goer & yet it seems that I've seen some of the greatest theater I know of:

Beckett's "Krapp's Last Tape"
Genet's "The Maids"
Pinter's "A Kind of Alaska" (based on the Oliver Sachs bk Awakenings)
Jarry's "Ubu Roi"
works by Studio Scarabee, Theatre X, Plan K, Impossible Theater
the list goes on & on (& simultaneously doesn't since I'm stopping it here)

but have I ever witnessed any plays by Ionesco? I really don't remember. Isn't that odd? I incorporated parts from the film version of his Rhinoceros into my feature-length movie Robopaths that I haven't been able to screen anywhere yet (HINT, HINT) Maybe I witnessed a play version as well..

"Choubert: [somewhat intrigued] No. I never knew them.

"Detective: Then how did you know his name ends in a t?

"Choubert: [very surprised] Why yes, of course, you're right... How do I know? How do I know?... How do I know?... I don't know how I know!

"Madeleine: [to Choubert] What's the matter with you? Answer him! When we're on our own you don't swallow your tongue. You talk so fast, you talk too much, such violent language too, and so loud. [To the Detective:] You don't know that side of him. He's a lot brighter than this, in private.

"Detective: I'll make a note of that.

"Madeleine: [to Detective] Still, I'm quite fond of him. After all, he is my husband, isn't he? [To Choubert:] Oh, come on, now! Did we know the Mallots or not! Say something! Try and remember!

"Choubert: [after struggling silently with his memory for a few moments, while Madeleine gets visibly more irritated and the Detective remains impassive] I can't remember! Did I know them or not!" (p 124, "Victims of Duty")

[truck w/ very muddy tires runs over last part rendering it semi-intelligible but remaining unnoticed by the reviewer]

All 3 of these plays are utterly, fantastically, wonderfully brilliant. & none of them are ruined for me by my having read them - I cd (& wish I wd) witness them as plays & be even more delighted. But, merdre!, I wish the translator, Donald Watson, hadn't written this in his "Retrospect" intro:

"Ionesco seems to have used The Bald Prima Donna as an experiment in verbal technique: it is more a question of finding equivalents in one's own language than of making a straight-forward translation, and the danger is that one may get carried away. An additional problem is the fact that this play is set in England and has some details that seem uncharacteristic to an English audience, and some references that are too specifically French: these, of course, had to be changed. This is not surprising when we realize that Ionesco had never been to England at the time: he found most of his inspiration in the Assimil Method of learning English. Though it must not be forgotten he has said that if he had been learning Spanish, the play would have been set in Spain."

I mean it makes me not quite trust the guy. Then again, it doesn't matter that much does it, eh? After all, The Bald Prima Donna isn't one of the plays in this collection.

These are all works of the imagination in the best possible sense. Ionesco goes every wch way & keeps things moving in a consistently interesting & surprising way. Take this bit from "Victims of Duty":

"Choubert: What do you think of the modern theater? What are your ideas on the drama?

"Madeleine: You and your theater! It's an obsession, you'll soon be a pathological case.

"Choubert: Do you really think something new can be done in the theater?

"Madeleine: I've just told you there's nothing new under the sun. Even when there isn't any.

"[Silence]

"Choubert: You're right. Yes, you're right. All the plays that have ever been written, from Ancient Greece to the present day, have never really been anything but thrillers. Drama's always been realistic and there's always been a detective about. Every play's an investigation brought to a successful conclusion. There's a riddle, and it's solved in the final scene. Sometimes earlier. You seek, and then you find. Might as well give the game away at the start." (p 119)

Of course, Ionesco then goes on to fuck w/ this formula in so many ways that the "thriller" aspect of it is both in the plot & in the plot's formal presentation.. there're so many ideas. I wonder if Ionesco was deliriously happy when he wrote this one?

In "Amédée or How to get rid of It" the audience/reader is taken on a merry ride that even bests Jarry at his own pataphysical game & that I find far more engrossing than Beckett ever is. Details like having Madeleine [the wife's name in the 2 plays where there're wives] be a switchboard operator whose switchboard is in the home (a situation highly improbably in 'real life') enable the playwright to create a polyphony of interwoven dialogs - what an inspired device! "Amédée" even has 2 alternative endings to enable easier realization for the theater producer. In "Victims of Duty", too, there're alternatives such as this: [If the prducer so desires, the same character who appeared before can be spotlighted again at the other side of the stage: he still has his number and, in addition, an alpenstock, a rope or a pair of skies. Once again he vanishes after a few moments.] (p 145)

[clicks red shoes together & chants to himself: "I want to witness all the Ionesco plays, I want to witness all the Ionesco plays] By the end, I almost found myself agreeing w/ the tongue-in-cheek megalomania:

"Detective: [crushed] Oh, yes, Monsieur, you do write! [In increasing terror:] Everyone ought to write.

"Nicolas: No point. We've got Ionesco and Ionesco, that's enough!" (p 162) show less

It's a good thing I had seen this play before I read it, or I would have believed it was unperformable. The stage directions call for things that would challenge most theatres, but in the end, apparently it can be done. This is the story of a king on his death bed who will not accept he is dying. His kingdom is falling apart, possibly because of his illness. Reading it, I was able to see things in it that I missed when watching it. Like, this feels very much like a Death of God play. The show more images, the lists of achievements of the king, leave very little doubt that either the people attending him in his last hours are building him up, or he was truly a powerful king. At first it feels like the first, but as I continued to read, it began to sound like the last. A truly absurd entry in the canon of one of the all time great absurdists. show less