Partant de la conjecture selon laquelle le « théâtre du verbe » de Valère Novarina est moins un phénomène singulier dans le paysage théâtral contemporain qu’une forme d’aboutissement des tentatives d’avant-garde précédentes en quête d’un théâtre dédramatisé fondé sur un langage « inhumanisé », cette étude retrace le chemin spirituel qui relie la pataphysique de Jarry à la logodynamique de Novarina, en passant par le nonsense chez Ionesco et chez Tardieu, chemin sous le signe du jeu verbal. En situant cette dernière notion dans la perspective moderne (anti-utilitaire et anti-anthropocentriste) du langage et du théâtre, le travail s’interroge, dans un premier temps, sur les relations particulières entre le jeu verbal et le théâtre « non dramatique » du XXe siècle. En examinant, dans un second temps, les quatre formes de jeu verbal chez Jarry, Ionesco, Tardieu et Novarina, aussi bien dans les écritures que dans des explorations scéniques, la thèse invite à comprendre le jeu verbal comme une manifestation du doute sur le langage, un pouvoir critique vis-à-vis des conformismes, un appel au changement de perception et au mouvement de toutes les « règles de jeu ». / Starting with the conjecture that Valère Novarina’s “theatre of the verb” is less a singular phenomenon in the contemporary theatrical landscape than a form of culmination of previous attempts to search for a dedramatized theatre based on a “dehumanized” language, this study retraces the spiritual path that connects Jarry’s pataphysics to Novarina’s logodynamics, via the nonsense in Ionesco and Tardieu’s writings, path under the sign of verbal game. By situating this last notion in the modern perspective (anti-utilitarian and anti-anthropocentric) of language and theatre, the study questions, firstly, the particular relations between the verbal game and the “non-dramatic” theatre of the twentieth century. Next, by examining the four forms of verbal game in Jarry, Ionesco, Tardieu and Novarina’s works, both in the scriptures and in scenic explorations, the thesis invites the readers to understand the verbal game as a manifestation of the doubt about the language, a critical power towards conformism, a call for change of perception and for movement of all “rules of the game”.

This essay is a study of the portrayal of the theme of alienation in Eugene Ionesco's novel The hermit. In my study I examine the different ways in which the theme of alienation is portrayed and how the cause of the narrator's experience of alienation can be found in ideological, psychological and existential conflicts that the narrator has to face. The result is an experience of das unheimliche, a Freudian concept, which is a kind of uncanny detachment that the narrator experiences, when he is put up against an invisible force that lurks in the perifery of the world, which is portrayed in the story. The meaning of the ideological conflict is a portrayal of man's situation in a world that is ruled by capitalism, with marxism as a positive leveler and the meaning of the psychological conflict is a conflict in the narrator's own inner reality. The meaning of the existential conflict is a portrayal of man's situation in a world absent of God. The novel by Ionesco points at these conflicts and also offers a solution to the limitations, that are caused by alienation by transcending them. In my study I focus on the function of language, biblical imagery, allegory and the theories that are being used to define the ideological (marxist theory) and existential (Albert Camus' theory of the absurd) conflicts. In my analysis I have also used Camus' The stranger in comparison with Ionesco's novel.

The intent of this thesis is to investigate the prominence of audience ridicule in the French theatre from the medieval sottie to Ionescan Absurdism of the mid-twentieth century. Throughout the history of French drama, playwrights have exploited this tactic with either the purpose of invoking an emotional or intellectual response or inciting a social or political call to action. This exploration takes particular interest in shaming theatrical audiences during periods of political unrest, analyzing the ways in which playwrights employed language, studies of characters, and plot-related content to highlight the prevalent and pervasive ills of society and of humanity. The majority of the literature from the sixteenth and seventeenth centuries criticizes the aristocracy, the clergy, and the crown. As we approach revolutionary France, the theatre all but abandons intrigue in favor of the tears that flowed that from the ocean of English Sentimentalism. Melodrama and the well-made play adorned the early-nineteenth century, while the later part of the century brought French theatre Jarry’s pataphysics and his affinity for audience shaming that set the stage for the impending onslaught of twentieth-century ridicule. The avant-garde movement flourished at the beginning of the century with the Dadas and the Surrealists responding to humanity’s response to the War to End All Wars. When Ionesco arrived at the forefront of the French theatre mid-century, he employed the most effective audience ridicule tactics invented by his predecessors and created his Absurdist theatre. Ionesco writes: “take a circle, caress it, and it will turn vicious” (38). From the fifteenth century to the twentieth century, the cycle of audience ridicule was indeed vicious in a theatre that sought to effect positive change in a rapidly changing society.