The Polyvalence of the Theatrical Language in No Exit

Abstract

IN ATIEMPTING TO DEFINE the fundamental characteristics of the new theater, Martin Esslin, in The Theatre of the Absurd, contrasts it with that of Camus and Sartre. According to Esslin, both Camus and Sartre have been satisfied to express new thoughts within the limits of a ready-made and conventional form. And Esslin feels that while the Theater of the Absurd, less logical and less discursive, reflects the art of the poet, the plays of Camus and Sartre reveal the attitude of the philosopher. When Michel Corvin or Genevieve Serreau study the avant-garde theater, they also leave these two playwrights outside the boundaries of their studies, and for the same reasons as Esslin. Ruby Cohn, however, in her recent book on contemp'orary theater, asks, without totally refuting Esslin's point of view, the only valid question: whether theater, however philosophical, is ever an expression of philosophy. And she suggests that it may be time to look at the plays of Camus and Sartre as plays. This is what I propose to do here, limiting my study to one of Sartre's plays: No Exit.