The significance of combining realism and theatre of the absurd in Amiri Baraka`s Dutchman - USD Repository
THE SIGNIFICANCE OF COMBINING REALISM AND THEATRE OF THE ABSURD
IN AMIRI BARAKA’S DUTCHMAN
AN UNDERGRADUATE THESIS Presented as Partial Fulfilment of the Requirements for the Degree of Sarjana Sastra in English Letters
By EMILIA TRISNA ARDIPUTRI
Student Number: 014214019 Student Registration Number:
ENGLISH LETTERS STUDY PROGRAMME DEPARTMENT OF ENGLISH LETTERS FACULTY OF LETTERS SANATA DHARMA UNIVERSITY
N o P a i n , N o G a i n N o P a i n , N o G a i n c i t e d f r o m E n g l i s h p r o v e r b c i t e d f r o m E n g l i s h p r o v e r b
( ( Z Z i i n n a a d d i i n n e e Z Z i i d d a a n n e e , , ) )
This undergraduate thesis is dedicated to: My beloved parents and My little twin sisters
ACKNOWLEDGEMENTS
I realize that this thesis can not be finished without helps of many people who care about me. Therefore, it is necessary for me to express my gratitude.
Firstly, I would like to thank my Lord and Jesus Christ who gives me a chance to experience this wonderful life. Secondly, my sincere gratitude goes to my advisor, Paulus Sarwoto, S.S, M.A. for his brilliant ideas, inspiration, and also his patience during the consultation. Then the gratitude goes to Gabriel Fajar Sasmita Aji, S.S, M.Hum. for the comments and suggestion.
I would like to thank my parents, drh. E. Sunaryo Kasman and Catharina Putranti for their unconditional love, support, and understanding; my twin sisters, Mawar and Melati for their unlimited love; Kasman and Mardisuwignyo big family especially Hendy, QQ, and Ninin for their attention and togetherness; my grandmother Marcella Sumarti for her never-ending prayer.
I must thank all of my friends from Bandar Lampung for the spirit and endless friendship. I thank all my friends in my boarding houses at ‘Tantular 400’ Pringwulung, ‘Mintin’ Paingan (my best Chef Sitti) and at ‘Menur’ Gorongan for sharing happy and difficult moments. I also thank all of the lecturers, staff and friends in English Letters USD especially Kittie, Henny, Ayu and Ririn.
I am grateful to all of my good fellows for their lovely friendships that make my life colourful and I never feel lonely. Last but not least, “Po” Abdullah for his long-waiting and companion until the end.
TABLE OF CONTENTS
TITLE PAGE ……………………………………………………......... i APPROVAL PAGE …………………………………………………… ii ACCEPTANCE PAGE ……………………………………………….. iii MOTTO PAGE ……………………………………………………….. iv DEDICATION PAGE ………………………………………………… v ACKNOWLEDGEMENTS …………………………………………… vi TABLE OF CONTENTS ……………………………………………... vii ABSTRACT …………………………………………………………... ix ABSTRAK ……………………………………………………………. x
CHAPTER I INTRODUCTION ……………………………………
1 A. Background of the Study …………………………………..
1 B. Problem Formulation ………………………………………
4 C. Objective of the Study ……………………………………..
4 D. Definition of Terms ………………………………………...
5 CHAPTER II THEORITICAL REVIEW ………………………….
7 A. Review of Related Studies …………………………………
7 B. Review of Related Theories .................................................
10
1. Theory of Realism …………………………………
10 2. Theory of Theatre of the Absurd ………………….
13 3. Theory of Structuralism in Literature ……………..
17 C. Theoretical Framework ……………………………………
19 CHAPTER III METHODOLOGY ................................................... 21 A. Object of the Study ……………………………………….
21 B. Approach of the Study ……………………………………
22 C. Method of the Study ……………………………………...
23 CHAPTER IV ANALYSIS ………………………………………..
25 A. Realism in Amiri Baraka’s Dutchman ……………………
25 1. The Realistic Setting ...............................................
26
2. The Realistic Issue: Racism ………………………
28 3. Social Protest ……………………………………..
35 B. The Characteristics of Theatre of The Absurd …………...
36
1. Incoherent Dialogue ………………………………
36
2. Incomprehensible Action …………………………
38 3. Combination of laughter with horror ……………..
39
4. Absurd Ending ……………………………………
40 C. The Significance of Combining Realism and Theatre of the Absurd ………………………………………………..
44
CHAPTER V CONCLUSION …………………………………….
50 BIBLIOGRAPHY …………………………………………………..
53 APPENDIX …………………………………………………………. 55
ABSTRACT
EMILIA TRISNA ARDIPUTRI. The Significance of Combining Realism and
Theatre of the Absurd in Amiri Baraka’s Dutchman. Yogyakarta: Department
of English Letters, Faculty of Letters, Sanata Dharma University, 2006.Every literary work has their own writing style or structure. There are some writing styles that have influenced literary work such as realism, theatricalism, minimalism (absurdist plays), or collecticism (feminist writing). The work analysed in this study is a play written by a famous black American playwright, Amiri Baraka (LeRoi Jones before) entitled Dutchman. Similar with the other black theatre, the theme of this play is about racism. The play is different because it combines two writing styles: realism and absurdist structure (known as theatre of the absurd). Through this combination, the play presents the life in United States during 1960s especially the issue of racism. The main aim of the study is to acknowledge the significance of combining the two writing styles.
In this study, there are three problem formulations. Firstly, to find and analyse the characteristics of racism in Amiri Baraka’s Dutchman; second, to analyse the characteristic of theatre of the absurd in the play; and the last to reveal the significance of combining realism and theatre of the absurd.
The method used for doing the thesis is library research. To answer those problem formulations, Structuralist approach is applied in the study. Structuralism enables the writer to analyse the context of larger structures of the text. By using Structuralist approach, the characteristics of realism, theatre of the absurd can be analysed in the study. Moreover, the writer can analyse the issue of racism which shows one characteristic of realism.
The analysis shows that the idea of realism in Amiri Baraka’s Dutchman is revealed through its realistic setting and its realistic issue. The setting of the play has the characteristic of realism. While, realistic or contemporary issue can be revealed through the actions and conversations of the characters. The action and conversations contain and describe injustice treatments toward black American. However, this play is not purely realistic because the structure of theatre of the absurd is found there. Finally in the end of the study, it is concluded that by combining realism and theatre of the absurd, the message of the play can be revealed. Beside of revealing contemporary social issue, through this combination Amiri Baraka reveals the world’s absurdity. The example of world’s absurdity revealed through the pointless dialogues which describe the behaviour of American people toward racism. The ending of this play shows that racism still exists.
ABSTRAK
EMILIA TRISNA ARDIPUTRI. The Significance of Combining Realism and
Theatre of the Absurd in Amiri Baraka’s Dutchman. Yogyakarta: Jurusan
Sastra Inggris, Fakultas Sastra, Universitas Sanata Dharma, 2006.Setiap karya sastra memiliki gaya penulisan dan struktur yang berbeda. Ada beberapa gaya penulisan yang mempengaruhi karya-karya sastra, antara lain realisme, teartikalisme, minimalisme (absurdisme), atau feminisme. Karya sastra yang dikaji dalam skripsi ini adalah sebuah karya penulis kulit hitam terkenal di Amerika, Amiri Baraka (sebelumnya LeRoi Jones), berjudul Dutchman. Seperti drama karya penulis kulit hitam lainnya, tema drama ini adalah tentang rasisme.
Yang membuat karya ini berbeda adalah karena drama ini menggabungkan gaya realisme dan absurdisme (yang dikenal dengan istilah ‘theatre of the absurd’). Dengan kombinasi ini, Amiri Baraka menggambarkan kehidupan nyata yang terjadi di Amerika pada era 1960an, terutama tentang isu rasisme. Tujuan utama penulisan skripsi ini adalah untuk menganalisa manfaat atau pentingnya menggabungkan dua gaya penulisan dalam sebuah drama karya Amiri Baraka ini.
Dalam skiripsi ini ada tiga pokok bahasan, yang pertama untuk mengetahui ciri-ciri drama realis yang terkandung dalam drama Dutchman; yang kedua untuk menganalisa gaya penulisan drama absurd yang tercermin dalam drama ini; dan yang terakhir untuk mengetahui manfaat penggabungan dua gaya penulisan dalam karya Amiri Baraka ini.
Metode yang digunakan adalah studi pustaka dan pendekatan struktural untuk menjawab pokok bahasan tersebut di atas. Strukturalisme memungkinkan penulis untuk mengkaji lebih luas tentang hal-hal yang berhubungan dengan karya itu sendiri. Dengan pendekatan struktural penulis dapat mengkaji realisme, absurdisme, dan terlebih lagi tentang rasisme yang terkandung dalam Dutchman.
Hasil analisa menunjukkan bahwa gaya realisme disampaikan melalui seting dengan gaya realistis dan isu-isu yang realistis pula. Seting dalam drama ini memiliki ciri drama realis. Sedangkan, isu realistis tersampaikan melalui lakon- lakon dan dialog para tokoh drama ini. Banyak lakon dan dialog dalam drama ini yang menyiratkan isu rasisme. Dialog-dialog itu juga menggambarkan perlakuan tidak adil yang diterima oleh masyarakat kulit hitam pada waktu itu. Bagaimanapun, karya ini bukan karya realisme murni karena dalam Dutchman juga ditemukan gaya drama absurd. Akhirnya dapat disimpulkan bahwa dengan menggabungkan realisme dan gaya drama absurd, pesan karya ini dapat disampaikan. Selain menyuguhkan problem sosial di masa itu, dengan kombinasi ini Amiri Baraka mengambarkan absudisme (keganjilan) dunia. Gambaran keganjilan dunia disampaikan melalui dialog-dialog yang tidak berarti yang menggambarkan tindakan penduduk Amerika terhadap isu rasisme. Akhir cerita dari drama ini menunjukkan bahwa masalah rasisme tetap berlanjut.
CHAPTER I INTRODUCTION A. Background of the study One kind of the literary work is play. Play is read daily by individuals such
as stage director, designers, actors, technicians, teachers, students, critics, scholars, and the people in general. In contrast to novel and poetry, play is often the most difficult type of prose or poetry to read because it is written not only to be read but also to be performed by actors before audiences. Reading play is a unique challenge. As readers, we must visualize all of the elements the playwright has placed on the page to convey a story to us: its characters in action and conflict, its happening in time and space, and, at the end the complete meaning of all that has happened (Barranger,1994: 4).
Barranger in Understanding Plays wrote that most modern plays have their roots in realistic writing styles that have influenced the contemporary American theatre, such as realism, theatricalism (expressionism and epic theatre), minimalism (absurdist plays), and collecticism (feminist writing). Plays written in our time have represented the multiple face of our contemporary world. However, two broad performance styles- realism and theatriticalism have dominated the modern theatre. One adheres to a candid representation of everyday reality and the other uses the stage to call attention to life’s theatricality (1994: 636).
As the image of truth verified by observing ordinary life, realism has been writing and theatre conventions of the past, especially the excesses of romantic character and situation, realism demanded that playwright, through direct observation of the world around them, depict that world truthfully (Barranger, 1994: 540).
While in 1950 in France, Eugene Ionesco, Samuel Beckett, Arthur Adamov, and Jean Genet pioneered new way of expressing their vision of an “absurd” universe that resulted in another theatre movement namely the theatre of
the absurd (Barranger, 1994: 636). Born in France, theatre of the absurd spread
widely and quickly around Europe and even United States. Martin Esslin wrote a footnote in his book Theatre of the Absurd which explains that finally this literary movement brought its impact to United States:
…Under the impact of events like the assassination of President Kennedy, the rise in racial tension and above all, the war in Vietnam, the self- confidence and naïve optimism of the United States has received a severe jolt. And there has been a veritable flood of plays –and novels-written in the absurdist vein. To do this movement justice would require a study of its own. All that can be done here is to mention the names of some the outstanding young writers who have emerged in this field: Paul Foster (Tom
Paine ), Megan Terry (Viet Rock), Rochelle Owens (Futzl), Jean-Claude van
Itallie (America Hurrah), LeRoi Jones (Dutchman), Ed Bullins (The Electric
Niggers ), Israel Horowits (This Indian Wants the Bronx). While these and
other plays in a similar style owe a great deal to improvisational techniques, they also quite clearly derive from the dramatists of the Absurd discussed in this book (Esslin, 1969: 266-267).
The object of this analysis is a play entitled Dutchman. As cited in quotation above, this play is written by LeRoi Jones who has changed his name as Amiri Baraka. Esslin includes him in the dramatist of the Absurd (and has a great deal of improvisational techniques). Beside, this play is a part of black theatre. In much the same way it was stimulated and influenced during the Harlem Renaissance. The powerful thrust of black theatre since 1960 has been accompanied by the development of new black playwrights, performers, critics, historians, and producers, as well as by an infinite number of theatre companies, amateurs, and semiprofessionals, professionals- along with an ever-growing and varied black audience. The writer of the play analyzed in this thesis, LeRoi Jones or now Imamu Amiri Baraka, has become the turning point of black theatre in 1960. Come with the dynamic emergence, brilliance, and style in The Slave, The
Toilet, The Baptism , and The Dutchman, he influenced a whole generation of
playwrights, black and white alike (Smythe, 1976: 705).Baraka’s reputation as a playwright was established with the production of
Dutchman at the Cherry Lane Theatre in New York on March 24, 1964. The play
was in manner of a seemingly realistic one act play, although there were some unrealistic elements. Clay’s big monologue became the text of the 1960 black activist. The play also won the Obie Award for best play and film has made (http://www.bridgeweb.com/blacktheatre/baraka.html).
It is written in Drama and Performance, An Anthology that Edward Parone, the director of the world premiere of Dutchman said: “These plays were written by writers in love with language- the ordering of words that turns chaos into poetry, art: work that not only means something but is something, something that never existed before, work that not only characterizes an age but is among the most eloquent expression of it” (Vena & Nouryeh, 1996: 881). Therefore it is interesting to analyze this play because beside its unique play because it combines two different writing styles: realism and the absurd. Baraka reveals the realistic issue of racism using the realistic setting.
However, the structure of theatre the absurd is seen in the play. Considering the benefit of using each writing styles, the writer thinks that there must be a significance of combining the two writing styles. Therefore, the study will be done to analyze the significance when both writing styles combined.
B. Problem Formulation
By conducting the analysis, the writer tries to answer three questions as follow:
1. What are the characteristics of realism found in Amiri Baraka’s Dutchman?
2. What are the characteristics of ‘theatre of the absurd’ found in Amiri Baraka’s
Dutchman ?
3. What is the significance of combining these two types of writing style? C.
Objective of the Study
The main aim of this analysis is to answer the questions as formulated in problem formulation above. First, the writer wants to identify how the play reveals the idea of realism. Second, to recognize the structure of the play which describe the idea of theatre of the absurd. Then, the writer will analyze the benefit of both writing styles. Finally after analyzing about two writing styles, the writer reveals the significance of combining the two writing styles in Dutchman.
D. Definition of Terms
In this section, the writer will explain some specific terms which are used in this undergraduate thesis, in order to avoid misunderstanding.
1. Realism
According to Encyclopedia of American Literature volume III, realism is a
th
movement in American literature which started in 19 century by the writers such as Mark Twain, Henry James, and William Dean Howells. It was waned in the
th
early 20 century, but as a mode of writing fiction, it has persisted. Writers such as John O’Hara, Hemingway, John Cheever, Ann Beattie, and Toni Morrison- to mention a small, noteworthy sample- have continued to produce stories and novels that are ‘realistic’ in the sense that they describe in minute detail their characters’ milieu and manners and attempt to faithfully record actual patterns of speech and modes of expression. These same authors and others have produced works that are in part realistic while adding a symbolic / mythic dimension (Rollyson, 2002: 206).
2. Theatre of the Absurd
According to Merriam Webster’s Encyclopedia of Literature, Theatre of the Absurd is the collection of dramatic works of certain European and American dramatist of the 1950s and early 60s who embraced Albert Camus assessment, in his essay Le Mythe de Sisyphe, that the human situation is essentially absurd, devoid of purpose. The term is also loosely applied to those dramatists and the
The ideas that informed the plays also dictated their structure. Absurd playwrights ignored most of the logical structures of traditional theatre. Dramatic action as such is negligible; what action occurs only serves to underscore the absence of meaning in the characters’ existence. The combination of purposeless behavior and ridiculous conversation gives the plays sometimes dazzling comic surface, but there is an underlying message of metaphysical distress (Webster, 1995: 1104).
7 CHAPTER II
THEORETICAL REVIEW
A. Review of Related Studies
The studies about Amiri Baraka’s Dutchman had been conducted by some other researchers. The first essay found in Mabel M. Smythe’s The Black
American Reference Book is written by Helen Armstead Johnson. This essay
entitled Black Influences in the American Theater: Part II, 1960 and After. In her essay, we will find LeRoi Jones or Amiri Baraka as the turning point of the 1960s Black movement who influenced a whole generation of playwright, black and white alike. Then, it contains the movement of LeRoi Jones or Baraka in the Black American Theatre. Johnson includes Dutchman in “Protest” and the Contemporary Theatre. Black literature often contains element of ‘protest’. The pattern of protest began to appear in a variety of forms, including romance and satire, comedy and tragedy, and other modes of dramatic structure. About LeRoi Jones’ Dutchman, she explained:
In fact LeRoi Jones’s The Dutchman comes within the boarder definition of protest, although his purely revolutionary plays would not. In The Dutchman the white girl listens to all that the black man says, although it is she, the protagonist, who is triumphant, the one who takes action. When the black man dies, another gets on the train, and we know that he too will die. The play ends up being a statement about the triumph of whites, one frequently made in black plays, no matter what the object of protest or how noble the aspirations of the characters (Smythe, 1976: 709-710). Donald P. Costello who was Associate Professor in the Department of
8 Black Man as Victim . In this essay Costello gave comments on the four of Baraka’s play: The Baptism, the Toilet, the Slave and Dutchman. He writes that
The Baptism is a comedy of cruelty (not racial). While, in the three other plays;
The Toilet , The Slave, and Dutchman, Baraka creates Black man as a victim. In
The Toilet , the victim is a black boy named Ray Foots who can not express his
love for a white boy named Karolis. In The Slave, as in his other play, Baraka makes the Black man as a victim, named Walker. Walker becomes the victim of his own philosophy. When talking about Dutchman, he saw Clay as a victim of racial issue. Costello wrote:
The victim in Dutchman is Clay, and this is a play about hatred…….In an interview, Jones said, “Dutchman is about the difficulty of becoming a man in America.” The boy who is “desperately trying to become a man” is Clay, twenty-year-old Negro. Lula, beautiful young white woman on the make, sits next to Clay on the subway. In brilliant dialogue (by far the best art Jones has shown in any of his plays) Clay’s lack of place is revealed to the audience. He doesn’t belong, for he doesn’t acknowledge his blackness. Costello then added that in Dutchman, as in his previous play’s The Toilet, Amiri Baraka speaks through controlled dramatic art (http://www.nathanielturner.com/leroijones2.htm).
The next criticism is written by Nita N. Kumar. She is a professor in a University of New Delhi. In her article The Logic Retribution: Amiri Baraka’s
Dutchman , she wrote about racial issues such as black identity and rejection of the
‘white world’. In addition, she discussed about Lula as a postmodernist (http://www.findarticles.com/p/articles/mi_m2938/is_2-3_37/ai_110531670/pg_4).
9 The other essay is written by Hamilton, an English teacher in Cary Academy, an innovative private school in Cary, North Carolina. In her essay, she discussed about Baraka’s concept of “Revolutionary Theatre” as it applies to his early play Dutchman (http://www.findarticles.com/p/articles/mi_m2938/is_2-3_37/ai_110531672).
The last essay related to this study is written by a student, compiled from http://allfreeessays.com/student/Bretch_Jones_and_Artaud.html. According to this essay, LeRoi Jones in Dutchman uses realistic, naturalistic and non-realistic elements to convey social issues such as racism in his own disillusioned style.
And the writer of this essay thinks that Jones’ portrayal is supported by the influences of Bertolt Brecht and Antonin Artaud, whose own disillusionment enhanced their works and greatly diversified theatrical conventions. This essay says that Bertolt Brecht influenced the non-realistic elements in Jones’ Dutchman:
Jones was influenced by Brecht by producing a play in a revolutionary poetic style which scrutinizes ideologies of race. Jones also modelled Brecht’s style of character development….This effect explains the murder of Clay resulting form a society that has perpetuated institutionalized racism and segregation as historically acceptable.
Beside, Jones goal in mind while creating Dutchman has the same aspiration with Brecht’s; to provoke an audience into reforming society and to leave audience with the need to take action against a social problem in order to complete an emotional cleansing.
While, Antonin Artaud had an influence on Jones’ style for theatre and cinema, envisioned as Theatre of Cruelty, shattered representation of spoken
10 language and carefully orchestrated theatrical action. The realistic side of Jones’s
Dutchman is the setting of this play, as stated in the essay:
Following in a realistic style, Jones sets the scene with a man sitting in a subway seat while holding a magazine. Dim and flickering lights and darkness whistle by against the glass window to his right. These aesthetic adornments give the illusion of speed associated with subway travel. Then, Artaud had directed his fury against a society which was in a state of constant confrontation by favouring controlled writing against dream imagery.
Jones’ use of dialogue, as spoken by Clay and Lula in Dutchman is an example of Artaud’s style of fury.
As explained above, according to the last essay, Amiri Baraka’s Dutchman is influenced by the style of Antoin Artaud who was a symbolist and Bertold Brecht who was an expressionist. Brecht had influenced the non-realistic elements of this play and its character development while Artaud had influenced Jones’ racy dialogue and violent gestures elemental in his Theatres of Cruelty. To elaborate that essay, this undergraduate thesis will analyse elements of realism and theatre of the absurd in Amiri Baraka’s Dutchman; its realistic setting and theme, and its structure of theatre of the absurd. Furthermore, this study will analyse the significance of mixing realistic and non-realistic elements.
B. Review of Related Theories
1. Theory of Realism
As a revolt against writing and theatre conventions of the past, especially
11 playwrights, through direct observation of the world around them, depict that world truthfully. The “real” meant essentially the impersonal and objective observation of the physical world and direct scrutiny of contemporary life and manners. The realist focused on the observed, material world around them and on contemporary social issues. Realistic playwright emphasized details of contemporary life based on the five senses of sight, hearing, taste, smell, and touch, and brought a new kind of recognizable truth to the stage by introducing subjects and characters not previously considered acceptable, especially for tragedy. The new realism shocked audiences and created by presenting such subjects as prostitution, poverty, ignorance, disease, judicial inequities, and adverse industrial condition (Barranger, 1994: 540).
Realism is closely linked as styles for effecting truthful, empirical depictions of life on stage. The movement away from the artificiality of romantic plot and character toward a drama of inner and outer truth is by and large the story of modern playwriting (and performances styles). Such playwright as Henrik Ibsen used the conventions of the well-made play with its compressed structure, family secrets, and end-of-act crises as a vehicle to present the new subjects and characters. There are several points of realism can be observed from realistic works as Henrik Ibsen’s. First, the new subjects dealt with corrupt business practices, social repression, exploitation, inherited disease, neurotic behaviour, conditioned mores, and outdated beliefs. Second, the new subject spawned a new kind of tragedy and tragic hero. Modern tragedy engages heredity (the past in the
12 Then, in new realistic text, dialogue approximates everyday conversation, dispensing with verse, soliloquies, and asides. In addition, the text’s signs and symbols are taken directly from the play’s environment (Barranger, 1994: 541- 542).
The well-made play which had been used by realist playwright appeared in Paris, led by Eugè ne Scribe. Under Scribe’s hand, the French style of play at that time acquired the apt name of la piè ce bien faite, or ‘the well-made play’. This term eventually represented any mechanical playwriting which placed too much emphasis upon an efficient plot. Then, the well-made plays of Émile Augier and Dumas fils added a new dimension to this drama by using the formula to make moral point. The focus of the stage in well-made play was always on a leading character, the hero or heroine or both, with whom the audience was expected to empathize. In the exposition of the hero’s situation, the audience was toll all it needed to know what had happened in the past, before the curtain rose. Thus, they could understand and accept the subsequent complication of the action that usually caused by the hero’s rival, the villain, or some form of obstruction. Matters would grow worse, and tension would be built up as hero’s fortunes seemed destined for disaster. This reversal was designed specifically to create suspense, and would delay the resolution of the play. However, the story usually turned upon some secret, of which the audience was aware, but of which hero knew nothing until the truth was conveniently revealed at the critical moment. Finally, the enemy would admit defeat and the hero could celebrate his triumph.
13 Emile Zola who was a famous French realist had contributed the significance of setting in realistic play. As written in Styan’s Modern drama in
theory and practice , Zola had stated that:
Stage scenery might be nothing but canvas and paint, but it was the theatre’s equivalent of the element of description in the novel. Moreover, scenery on the stage remained vividly before the eyes for as long as the curtain was up, a background and environment for the characters which would be faithful to the author’s conception. A factory, a mine, a market, a railway station or a race track could supply all the colour and life any play could desire, even when the aim was not one of decoration, but of dramatic utility. In his thinking about realism, Zola believed that it was necessary for every play to have its appropriate setting; he could not conceive that an abstract or neutral background might heighten the detail and particularity of dialogue and behaviour. For him the rule was that a lifelike setting encouraged lifelike costumes, which encouraged lifelike dialogue (Styan, 1981: 9-10).
The depression years of 1930s in America brought a new realistic tradition; the drama with social protest, or even propaganda. Designers of such plays of social realism, like Mordecai Gorelik, would always research the actual locale of the play, whether it was a street or a dockyard, a farm or an iron foundry, and then attempt to create the idea as well as the atmosphere of the subject in the setting they designed (Styan, 1981: 125).
2. Theory of Theatre of the Absurd
It is written in Barranger’s Understanding Plays that in 1961, Martin
14 writers such as Samuel Beckett, Eugene Ionesco, Arthur Adamov, and had observed certain common attitudes toward the predicament of human beings in the universe in writings of this group of dramatists following the Second World War.
Albert Camus had earlier summarized the predicament as “absurd” in his essay
The Myth of Sisyphus (1941) which diagnosed humanity’s plight as purposeless in
an existence out of harmony with its surroundings. In most dictionary definitions,
absurd means ‘out of harmony with reasons and propriety’. Esslin added
ridiculous, incongruous, and unreasonable. While, in Notes and Counter Notes:
Writings on the Theatre , Ionesco redefined absurd as ‘anything without a goal’,
cited by Barranger: …when man is cut off from his religious or metaphysical roots, he is lost; all his struggles become senseless, futile and oppressive (Barranger, 1994: 636). The theme of theatre of the absurd is almost same with the work of writers or philosophers like Giraudoux, Anouilh, Salacrou, Sarte, and Camus: sense of metaphysical anguish at the absurdity of the human condition. Although their theme is almost the same, these writers differ from the dramatist in the way they express it, as Martin Esslin had explained:
Yet these writers differ from the dramatists of the Absurd in an important respect: they present their sense of the irrationality of the human condition in the form of highly lucid and logically constructed reasoning, while the Theatre of the Absurd strives to express its sense of the senselessness of the human condition and the inadequacy of the rational devices and discursive thought.
In other word, while Sarte or Camus express the new content in the old convention , or in well-constructed and polished plays, the theatre of the absurd
15 goes up a step further in trying to achieve a unity between its basic assumption and the form in which these are expressed (Esslin, 1969: 5-6).
Martin Esslin in his book The Theatre of the Absurd has differentiated characteristics of theatre of the absurd with the characteristic of a good play. If a good play must have a cleverly constructed story, theatre of the absurd has no story or plot to speak off, if a good play is judged by subtlety of characterization and motivation, theatre of the absurd are often without recognizable characters and present the audience with almost mechanical puppets; if a good play has to have a fully explained theme, which is neatly exposed and finally solved, theatre of the absurd often has neither a beginning nor an end; if a good play is to hold the mirror up to nature and portray the manners and mannerisms of the age in finely observed sketches, theatre of the absurd seems often to be reflections of dreams and nightmares; if a good play relies on witty repartee and pointed dialogue, theatre of the absurd often consist or incoherent babblings (Esslin, 1969: 3-4).
Related to the significance of the absurd, Martin Esslin wrote that “Theatre of the Absurd fulfils a dual purpose and presents its audience with a two-fold absurdity. In one its aspects it castigates, satirically, the absurdity of lives lived unaware and unconscious of ultimate reality. In its second, more positive aspect, behind the satirical exposure of the absurdity of inauthentic ways of life, the Theatre of the Absurd is facing up to a deeper layer of absurdity- the absurdity of the human condition itself in a world where the decline of religious belief has deprived man of certainties” (Esslin, 1969: 351-352).
According to Esslin, theatre of the absurd has double purpose. At first, it castigates the absurdity of life. Secondly, it faced up the absurdity of human condition in a world where religion becomes less important.
16 In Chapter IV subchapter B, this study analyzes about the structure of theatre of the absurd. According to Richard Goldstone in Contexts of the Drama, structure is the matter of the arrangement and emphasis of events in the play. Every play contains its own structure. The structure of the most important dramatic work of the twentieth century is unrelated to the dramatic structure of anything that came before. Pirandello, Brecht, and Samuel Becket all turned their back upon the conventions governing conventional dramatic structure (Goldstone 1960: 3-4).
According to Barranger, Dramatic structure is the overall pattern that gives a special shape to a drama, either compressing or expanding the mystery of human behaviour into a semblance of time, space, and living presence. There are some varieties of dramatic structure; climatic, episodic, situational, and reflexive.
These terms are descriptive of plays by Sophocles, William Shakespeare, Samuel Beckett, and Heiner Muller. A play’s structure gives form to the physical, psychological, and philosophical experiences contained collectively in the text’s action, plot, characters, speech, and locales. Barranger includes absurdist plays in the situational play structure. In absurdist plays, situation shapes the action, not plot or character. The problem of absurdist writers was to find a dramatic structure to present a world devoid of clear-cut purpose with infinitive possibilities for bitter truths. Situation, then, became the mirror of an unchanging reality with an infinite number of interpretations. Absurdist play structure must, therefore, reject logical progression and reveal irrationality of the human condition. However,
17 unchanged at the play’s end, these rhythms move in a recurring cycle beginning with a situation that develops (a) increasing tension, (b) leading to some type of explosion, (c) and returning to the original situation. Moreover, the characters in absurdist plays often repeat the same dialogue, in reverse, in the final moments of each part. For example, in Samuel Beckett’s Waiting for Godot:
Estragon, Vladimir: “Well, shall we go?” Vladimir, Estragon: “Yes, let’s go.” Stage directions: They do not move. (Barranger 1994: 263-265).
3. Theory of Structuralism in Literature
Structuralism is an intellectual movement which began in France in the 1950s, imported into Britain in 1970s and spread widely throughout the 1980s.
According to Peter Barry in Beginning Theory: An Introduction to Literary and
Cultural Theory , the essence of structuralism is the belief that things cannot be
understood in isolation, they have to be seen in the context of the larger, abstract structures they are part of (Barry, 2002: 39-40). Thus, the structuralists approach to literature not only interprets individual literary work but understanding the larger, abstract structures which contain them. These structures are usually abstract such as the notion of the literary or the poetic, rather than ‘mere’ concrete specifics like a conventional literary history (Barry, 2002: 39-40).
In his beginning explanation about Structuralism, Barry uses the crude analogy of chickens and eggs. Donne’s poem “Good Morrow” is taken for the example. In the case of that poem, the relevant genre is the alba (a poetic form dating from the twelfth century in which lovers lament the approach of daybreak
18 without some notion of the concept of courtly love, and further, the alba supposes knowledge of poetry. Barry regards the containing structure (alba, courtly love, poetry itself as a cultural practice) as the chicken and the individual example (Donne’s poem in this case) as the egg (2002: 40).
It is Swiss linguist Ferdinand de Saussure (1857 – 1913) who become a key figure in the development of modern approaches to language study included structuralism. One of them gives the structuralists a way of thinking about the larger structures which are relevant to literature. He uses the terms langue and
parole to signify, respectively language as a system or structure on the other hand,
and any given utterance in that language on the other. Now, structuralists make use of the langue / parole distinction by seeing the individual literary work as an example of a literary parole (such as a novel). It only makes sense in the context of some wider containing structure. So, the langue which relates to the parole (such as a novel) is the notion of the novel as a genre (Barry, 2002: 44).
What makes the structuralists different from liberal humanist is that their comments on structure, symbol, and design become paramount, and are the main focus on the commentary, while the emphasis on any wider moral significance, and indeed on interpretation itself in the broad sense, is very much reduced. What structuralists critics do is firstly analyse prose narratives, relating the text to some larger containing structure. Second, they interpret literature in terms of a range of underlying parallels with the structures of language, as described by modern linguistics (Barry, 2002: 49-52).
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4. Theoretical Framework
Theories and related studies discussed above have been useful for the research conducted by the writer. By doing review of related studies, the writer is able to find opinion of the critics about the work analysed. Finally, it is acknowledged that this research is worth studying and will be useful for readers.
Beside, they add more information about the literary work analysed in the study. Then, theory of realism help the writer to understand the characteristic of realistic play which is become the discussion of the first problem formulation and will be analysed in chapter IV subchapter I. Theory of theatre of the absurd helps the writer to recognize the characteristics of theatre of the absurd. Thus the writer will be able to answer problem formulation number two and analyse the characteristic of theatre of the absurd in Amiri Baraka’s Dutchman. While, theory of Structuralism help the writer to understand the method of analysing a literary work using structuralists approach and then for apply it on this study. Peter Barry wrote that:
“You will see that your structuralist approach to it is actually taking you further and further away from the text, and into large and comprehensive abstract question of genre, history, and philosophy, rather than closer and closer to it” (2002: 20).
So, in this study, Structuralism enables the writer to relate the play itself with the larger structures; realism and theatre of the absurd. If the writer has to apply the parable off chicken and egg, the writer considers the containing structure (the writing styles, racism, the structure of theatre of the absurd) as the chicken and the play itself (Amiri Baraka’s Dutchman) as the egg. As a Structuralist, the first thing
20 theatre of the absurd. Further, the discussion about realism demands the writer to explore the concept of realistic setting and issue of racism. If successfully analyse the elements of realism and theatre of the absurd, the significance of combining the two writing styles will be revealed.