An Arendtian Reading of Eugene Ionesco’s Rhinoceros and Liwaa Yazji’s Goats through the Notions of Totalitarianism and The Banality of Evil

Abstract

This paper is a comparative literary study of two absurd plays: Eugene Ionesco’s Rhinoceros (1959) and Liwaa Yazji’s Goats (2018). It traces their points of overlap with and departure from the tenets of the Theatre of the Absurd; illustrates the theoretical framework of Hannah Arendt’s notions, as introduced in The Origins of Totalitarianism (1951) and Eichmann in Jerusalem: A Report on the Banality of Evil (1963); and attempts to answer these questions: How does Totalitarianism use propaganda, terror, and religion to brainwash the minds of the Romanians and Syrian? How does Arendt’s banality of evil explain conformity and loyalty? Both playwrights employ elements of distanciation: Ionesco uses metatheatre and Yazji uses videos, screens, camera gaze, crowds, and six goats on the stage to incite spectators to think and break the illusion. The paper also entails a recognition of ‘animality’ and offers to conceptualize this term vis a vis totalitarianism and the Theatre of the Absurd.