六零年代的冷戰戲劇:品特、艾爾比及懷斯

Abstract

本論文著重探討荒謬戲劇如何受到六零年代冷戰時期之影響而產生變異，其中的三個章節依時代順序編排，分析三部於六零年代首演的戲劇:哈洛‧品特的《升降機》(1957，於1960首演)、愛德華‧艾爾比的《誰怕維吉尼亞‧伍爾芙?》(1962，於1963首演)(同名電影譯為《靈慾春宵》)、以及彼得‧懷斯的《馬拉/薩德》(1933，於1964首演)。劇評家及戲劇研究學者馬丁‧埃斯林之著作《荒謬劇場》也提及此三部劇作之重要性，分別將其收錄在不同章節分析討論。本文旨在分析探究荒謬戲劇及冷戰之關係，尋找政治張力所帶給荒謬之新定義。 第一章節由分析比較哈洛‧品特的《升降機》及荒謬劇作代表薩繆爾‧貝克特的《等待果陀》開始，進而展開論述，說明荒謬本質因不同時代背景而產生之轉變，舉凡品特劇中特有的脅迫、刺探等氛圍，皆未曾在貝克特的劇中呈現。 第二章承接第一章之論述，呈現《誰怕維吉尼亞‧伍爾芙?》本部荒謬劇作與六零年代冷戰之關聯性，劇中角色之命名及人物之互動可喻為冷戰時期國與國之間互動之擬態。 第三章節則由劇作家懷斯的生平開始，探討其因戰事而踏上之放逐生涯如何反映至其劇作《馬拉/薩德》，又此劇作如何反映六零年代劇作家的政治不確定性。 荒謬劇作在六零年代冷戰氛圍影響之下，產生了新義，綜觀此三部劇作與冷戰之關聯性，便能悉知荒謬不再只是對自我的懷疑，冷戰時期的荒謬更添加了政治批判色彩。

The thesis is an explication of the Theatre of the Absurd in the context of the Cold War in the sixties. It is going to revisit three plays—Harold Pinter’s The Dumb Waiter (1957, premiered in 1960), Edward Albee’s Who’s Afraid of Virginia Woolf? (1962, premiered in the same year) and Peter Weiss’s Marat/Sade (1963, premiered in 1964)—all of which are discussed in Martin Esslin’s The Theatre of the Absurd. This thesis seeks to pin down their relationship with the Cold War, as the political tension therein gives absurdity a new meaning which is worth studying. Chapter one begins with Pinter’s The Dumb Waiter, to compare and contrast it with Beckett’s Waiting for Godot, which Esslin declares “marked the emergence of a new type of theatre.” In his book The Theatre of the Absurd, the playwrights—Beckett, Ionesco, Genet, Pinter and others—depict the human condition of absurdity such as futility after the world wars, and the lack of communication, and the doubt of being. But the menace and cynical atmosphere of Pinter’s play could hardly be found in Beckett’s play. The language of Pinter and later playwrights no longer functions as absurdist purposeless fragments; it becomes a medium to spy, to predict actions, or even to attack others. Chapter two follows the argument that the Theatre of the Absurd has changed in the sixties due to the increasingly nervous political atmosphere. Albee’s Who’s Afraid of Virginia Woolf? is an example of the absurdist theatre becoming a vessel to convey, rather than contemplate on, that atmosphere. Its allegorical naming of the characters and the games of tactics indicate the Cold War. Albee not only writes a family drama but one that connotes the brinksmanship between the nations and the fear of deserting one’s illusions to face the reality. The last chapter focuses on Weiss’s Marat/Sade, which mixes reality with fiction, interpreting the eighteenth-century French Revolution in the context of the Cold War in the sixties. The play is a combination of a little bit of everything—Brechtian, Artuadian, and absurdist. The focus of this chapter would be the absurdist elements that are tied to the Cold War, showing how Weiss converts his life experience in exile into the energy of protesting his political point of view in Marat/Sade. The absurdity of staging the Cold War in the sixties no longer centers on the senselessness and the looping repetition of the human loneliness. Instead, the playwrights who capture the Zeitgeist during the peak of the Cold War have revealed in their plays the senselessness of the Cold War ideology, espionage and psychological uneasiness.