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Theatre of the Absurd
These four plays of Ionesco, among the very first that he wrote, already show him preoccupied with themes that will concern him for the rest of his career in theatre: the futility of language, the terror of ideological conformity, and theorizing about the play within the framework of the play itself.This volume includes "The Bald Soprano," "The Lesson," "Jack; Or, The Submission," and "The Chairs."Needless to say, giving a summary, insofar as one could eve be adduced, would go against the spirit of absurdism generally speaking.After all, the plots are not the most interesting things in the plays.

Ionesco got the idea for "The Bald Soprano" while trying to learn Assimil method.His textbook had two characters, Mr. and Mrs. Smith (who also appear in his play), and who, despite being married to one another, feel compelled to describe one another's physical appearance, tell one another that they are both English as if all of this was genuinely new information.Mr. and Mrs. are the epitome of the English bourgeois, speaking in stock phrases and clichés (How curious it is, how curious it is, how bizarre, and what a coincidence!") so worn with use as to be devoid of any meaning.The dialogue between the characters provides a discursiveness with which he points to the emptiness and futility of language, the hopelessness of communication.

Ionesco describes "The Lesson" as a "comic drama," though I found difficulty founding anything comic in it.In this play, he takes on the subject of authoritarianism as a professor of philology (which "always turns into calamity," according to his maid) relentlessly and unmercifully lectures a female student.When she proves unable to understand much of the material, he grows increasingly violent, with the student ending up dead.At the very end of the play, we learn that she is the professor's fortieth victim.And another one is walking in the door.So much for the victory of Reason.

Unlike the work of other absurdists, Beckett for example, Ionesco's plays are ostentatious, full of lively dialogue, and never inward-looking or contemplative, although many of Ionesco's themes are also Beckett's.The narrativity of drama, or the lack thereof, or even the possibility thereof, is a subject of both of their work.

At least for me, these plays are fun, but only in small doses.The constant litany of illogical non sequiturs and trying to keep track of all the characters that have similar names can become a little taxing and grating if the exposure goes on for too long.Nevertheless, these plays have aged remarkably well, and they remain one of the best introductions to the Theatre of the Absurd for the uninitiated.

Impossible is nothing
I sort of grew up with Ionesco. This crazy Romanian turned Frenchman with his absurd stage plays, the Bald Soprano and stuff like that, was synonym for art trash in yahoo speak. He wrote like abstract painters painted. Good honest citizens detested that kind of stuff and complained when theatres and museums who were subsidized by public funds played or diplayed it. Ionesco was the equivalent of Picasso in my home town red neck cultural perspective. (Please note that I am German, not Kentuckian.
Apologies to Kentucky, should I have said Oklahoma? Anyway, German backwoods are no different.)
Then I take a big leap with the time machine. No encounters with Ionesco since maybe the 60s. Plenty with Picasso though, who became one of my heroes (and one of my favorite writers, P. O'Brian, wrote a good biography, which I reviewed here, but I pulled the review out since nobody was interested).
And now my daughter, who is doing her IB with drama as elective subject, chose The Lesson for her graduation stage production. I read it first and told her she is crazy. Nobody can play this mad professor who kills his private students after endless absurd monologues on philology (which leads to calamity, as the maid says). As any self-respecting 18 year old would, she ignored my ignorant advice and did it anyway. She found a fantastic actress to do the mad old professor, a 16 year old American Chinese girl who must have been born for this part. And perfect fits for the pupil and the maid as well.
I have not had so much fun in a theatre for a long time. Hail to old Ionesco! And kudos to the producer and director of the play on this day!

"That's because we live in the suburbs of London and because our name is Smith."
I've seen The Bald Soprano and The Chairs performed, and it has been on my list for quite a while to read them both. The other two plays in the volume I saw as a kind of bonus.

The Chairs is the gem in the book. It was just as wonderful to read as it was to see. Ionesco and his feel for the absurdities in language is always charming, but the Chairs combines that sense of fun and the absurd with some very real pathos.

I was not familiar with Jack, and was glad to have a chance to read it. The bride with three noses and the absurd Grandmother and Grandfather Jack are wonderful characters-- I look forward to having an opportunity to see this staged.

Essential reading for people with an interest in the Theater of the Absurd.

Ionesco!
As history tells us, the Frenchman Eugene Ionesco was learning English in the late 1940s when he was struck by the arbitrary nature of the sentences used to teach foreign language.("I have a dog.His name is Spot.My name is Duncan.")Their nihilism and nonsensicality became the basis for his first play, La cantatrice chauve -- The Bald Soprano.People mostly love it or hate it; I love it."Experience teaches us that when one hears the doorbell ring it is because there is never anyone there."This is definitely fun.Of Ionesco, I will always say:Worth a read.

Without a Doubt the Worst Book I Have Ever Read
This is simply the worst book that I have ever read. Without any doubts in my mind, I can say that Eugene Ionesco is the luckiest man alive for making money off of this horrible excuse for a book. Do not waste your money on trash like this. Paper wasted on this book could have been used for things much more important. The book was written to not make any sense. Do not try and say that it's funny or absurdist. I could write this filth in less than an hour. Blindfolded. And you could give the computer a spear even. Eugene Ionesco wrote this book for money and nothing else. If you call this book hilarious than you need to go out, see some good movies and then reconsider your thoughts about what is funny and what isn't. Do not waste your money on this book. I have wasted my time reading it thinking that there may be something rewarding at the end, but unsurprisingly it let me down and ended in a fantastically horrible fashion. You can call this book absurdist all you want, but your better off just calling it a fire starter. ... Read more

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Enduring writer
Ionesco has written wonderful plays showing the idiocy of modern life and its materialistic bent.It is perfect for the very sad and realistic times we live in; his absurdity has become our reality.He, with great artistry, has held up the mirror to a corrupt society on the political, social, psychological and religious levels.He doesn't pull punches.Everyone should read him.He's profound.And yes he does use humor to make his points.

Audacious Absurdity
Every time I read an absurdist play, I feel the typical symptoms: confusion, isolation, annoyance, and enlightment. Ionesco did not fail to dissapoint. That is he did not fail to deliver a play in pure absurdist form. Although the absurd structure is not easy to identify, one can always pinpoint it. Reading these play I heard many questions being asked: "how do humans fulfill their essence?", "is it necessary to commit to an ideal in order for life to have meaning?". These questions alone made it easy to distinguish what kind of plays these were about.
Ionesco sets forth plays questioning the appeal of power and beauty and its detrimental effects on human nature, more specifically with "Rhinocerous". I have heard many people say that this play deals mainly with the concept of human conformity, but is it really conformity when humans are drawn to an ideal and desire to portray it. Is power, beauty and love a form of conformity, or human nature? Are the Rhinoceri a representation of human nature in its purest state, or human nature gone awry?

A classic reconsidered
Perhaps it has to do with time, but I think Rhinoceros reads better from a perspective other than the one having to do with fascism. I chose to direct it recently from a very different point of view and one, I think, that would facilitate a bristling reading. The play is not about fascism per se, but rather about the rigidity of social convention, which was one of Ionesco's concerns. Just listen to Jean's constant criticisms of Berenger's appearance and behavior. The first time the Rhinoceroses appear, Berenger has had enough of Jean and is, wishfully thinking, wishing ill upon him. Why a Rhinoceros? Perhaps because Jean is so prissy; perhaps Berenger wishes he was thick-skinned enough to shrug off Jean's derision. The first act ends, indeed, with an argument between the two. Think of the appearance of the Rhino in the second act as an unconcsious working out of his wishful thinking: Jean is replaced by the insulting and condescending Dudard. Either Berenger misfires or he is testing--through Mrs Boeff--whether love can withstand "Rhinoceritis". It appears it can. Notice his conversations with Daisy. Read Act Three as Berenger taunting, harassing, and inflicting Rhinoceritis upon Jean in a kind of coup de grace, separating himself completely from Jean and the conventions he stands for. In the fourth act, however, we see the daydream get out of his control because, as Jean told us in the beginning, Berenger's thinking is all muddled; Daisy catches the 'disease' as she tries to win or seduce him, but he himself is, ironically, immune or a coward. Ionesco, of course, is richer than a simplistic point a view; but as Jean, again, tells us in the beginning, Berenger is a dreamer, and examining Berenger's state of mind as the cause of the rampant and rampaging outbreak of Rhinoceritis makes for acomic and tragic reading and very entertainig piece of theatre.

Dated Translation
Ionesco is one of the greatest of the absurdist playwrights. Rhinoceros is a great piece -- an amalgam of comedy and tragedy that will have you doubled over in laughter one moment and desperately frightened the next.

That being said, this translation has some serious problems. It was very strange to read as an American in 2004, because it is written in the English spoken in Great Britain in the 1960s. In addition to serious liberties taken by the translator (i.e. simply leaving out certain lines), there sometimes crops up a lack of flow that is all too common in translated literature.

Despite the fact that it's time for a new translation, I highly recommend Ionesco's plays, and Rhinoceros in particular. If you know French, read the original!

Surprisingly relevant for our times
One could do worse than to commemorate the installation of George W. Bush as President-apparent of the United States by reading "The Leader," one of the short plays in this collection.(My favorite quote these days: "But -- the Leader hasn't got a head!" "What's he need a head for when he's got GENIUS?")_Rhinoceros_ itself, of course, in its slow-motion documentation of the "rhinozation" of an entire populace, was originally a trope on the rise of Nazism, but could certainly be applied to the gradual rightward shift of the American political spectrum. ... Read more

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Excellent play, excellent condition
The book, apparently out of print, arrived very late, but in excellent condition,as new. Saw play on Broadway. Recommend both book and play!

A book about preparing to Die
Some say philosophy is simply the study of how to accustom man to let go of life.And, Exit the King deals exactly with this subject.The King, believed by some to be a metaphor for God (but that involves whole different implications) is dying.His kindom is falling apart and falling into nothingness.The King, at the urgings of "the Doctor," is forced to face that indeed, he will die within the course of this play.

Denial, Anger...all the usual forms of defense the King plays.The play centers around how the King is to deal with his impending death.

Marguerite, his young second wife, begs him to live in the moment, and the power of love and happiness in the present will overcome even death.Deny, and live in the present.

Marie, his older first wife, demands the King face reality, and look death in the face, scolding him for not doing so all his life and for being so ill prepared.She, in this short play, urges him through the process of letting go of his defenses and his insecurities, and embrace death.

The play is a thought provoking one, and an excellent short read.

Loved it!
This book made me think: am I the king that lives his life and doesn't care what happens? When I am just about to die, will I be regretting just like this king does? Am I living my life to its full extent? Some good philosophical questions are raised in the book. I recommend you to read it. ... Read more

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Exit the King
From the cover:This is a highly stylized, ritualistic death rite, depicting the final hours of the once-great Berenger I.In his throne room, surrounded by his two wives and a few other members of the decayed court, Berenger inexorablymoves toward his death, first discovering, then rejecting, and finally accepting its inevitability.As the monarch dies, his kingdom dies with him. ... Read more

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These three great plays by one of the founding fathers of the theatre of the absurd, are alive and kicking with tragedy and humour, bleakness and farce. In "Rhinoceros" we are shown the innate brutality of people as everyone, except for Berenger, turn into clumsy, unthinking rhinoceroses. "The Chairs" depicts the futile struggle of two old people to convey the meaning of life to the rest of humanity, while "The Lesson" is a chilling, but anarchically funny drama of verbal domination. In these three 'antiplays' dream, nonsense and fantasy combine to create an unsettling, bizarre view of society. ... Read more

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A Play Relevant to Our Times
I have long been an admirer of Eugène Ionesco, with his playful wit and keen insights into human nature.This play is certainly among his best.The inspiration for it was the Nazi phenomenon in the Europe of the 20th century, but the theme is timeless, since we are all too prone to follow slavishly whatever movements we encounter in our society. To do so makes us less than human.The play's hero, Bérenger, is full of flaws, but he is paradoxically the only character capable of resisting the allure of the herd mentality.The play not only has a powerful message; it is also lots of fun to read.

An stampede of
Euguene Ionesco (1912-1994) was born in Romania, but lived a great part of his life in France. He was an important exponent of what became known as "the Theatre of Absurd", a kind of avant garde theatre that was born more or less in the 1950s and that somehow manages to transmit a message through irrational speech and strange occurrences that take place in what seem at first glance as common situations. Other exponents of this kind of theatre are, for example, Samuel Beckett, Jean Genet and Harold Pinter

"Rhinoceros" was written by Ionesco in 1958, and has a strange plot. The main character is Berenger, a Frenchman who likes to drink a lot. Berenger doesn't seem to mind when a rhinoceros first appears running past his town square, while he is talking with his friend Jean. Everybody else is astounded, but they are truly horrified when the same rhinoceros (or maybe another one) returns and even kills a cat.Even that doesn't shake Berenger, unfortunately. The situation is almost dramatically altered later, when Berenger realizes that many of his acquaintances are turning into rhinoceros without apparent reason. The pertinent questions are quite a few, for instance: will rhinoceros ultimately prevail?. And can an average person resist to conformity, or is the temptation to be like everybody else to big?.

This book can be understood as a metaphore regarding nazism and its diffusion in Germany, and has a lot to do with Ionesco's experiences with the Nazis. However, its main theme is the rise of totalitarism, the kind of behaviour and relativism that takes a country to that, and the dehumanization of those that succumb to conformism (like the human beings that slowly turn into rhinoceros, almost indistinguishable from each other). Due to that, "Rhinoceros" was considered a dangerous play by more than one totalitarism. For instance, the play was to be produced in the URSS, but the government wouldn't allow it to be played if Ionesco didn't say that the rhinoceros were the Nazis and not them. As Ionesco refused to do so, "Rhinoceros" couldn't be played...

On the whole, I can say that I really liked this play. It is interesting, easy to read (yes, without overly difficult vocabulary!!) and has a deeper meaning that shouldn't be lost to us. That is, conformity isn't the answer when an stampede of "rhinoceros" tries to run over us...

Belen Alcat
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I believe in my soup.
Jean lives with his lovely wife, a quiet life of boredom and resignation, in a miserably drearly home.Jean's wife is a study in satisfaction.The home is crumbling around them, yet she is not motivated to seek change.Jean wants more.He is continuously unsatisfied; he longs for a more exciting and fulfilling life.After enduring a visit from a ghost aunt, Jean disappears.Literally vanishing into thin air, Jean moves into another plane of existence.

In scene two, Jean appears on a platform suspended in air.He is trying to find his wife.Two employees guarding the entrance of a museum (?!) talk with him.It seems Jean has already seen beautiful views and breathtaking vistas on his journey-- images much cheerier than the walls of his dingy and sinking home.

In scene three, Jean arrives at an inn run by fake monks.He is fed.He imbibes, but he is never satisfied.Always hungry and thirsty, Jean sits while the monks pump him for information.What has he seen?Where has he been?It seems these monks are too eager for news of the outside world.They prepare and stage a grotesque play for Jean's benefit.During the play, one of the monks insists that Jean answer the question "what do you believe in?"Tiring of the performance and famished, Jean answers "I believe in my soup!" After witnessing this crass farce, Jean begins his monastic duty:serving food.As the scene winds down, it is apparent (to the reader, but not to the protagonist) that Jean will never leave.Through insinuations and inferences, the reader comes to realize that the inn is, in fact, hell.

In Hunger and Thirst, Ionesco has succeeded in showing desperation and the impossibility of satisfaction.Jean, a romantic seeker, is left in the end wondering why he ever wished for more than his modest home and wife.Throughout, the play is funny.As valuable as the author's best known work (Rhinoceros, or perhaps The Bald Soprano), Hunger and Thirst is rarely mentioned in a list of Ionesco's best drama.I take exception to such an ignorant omission.Hunger and Thirst measures up to any of Ionesco's plays. ... Read more

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Part diary, part autobiography, part self-analysis and commentary, this revealing memoir by the playwright of the Absurd is an expression of the writer's search for the wellsprings and justifications of his existence. Diary jottings mingle with searing memories of his authoritarian father, metaphysical musings with thoughts on anti-Semitism, his wartime experiences, Soviet death camps, and the sham of bourgeois "revolutionaries". There is also the occasional light-hearted fantasy, played out with children who might be his own; the germ of the idea for "Rhinoceros" and various passages of self-probing. ... Read more

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a pleasure for reading
I've found it a pleasure for reading and, what is more, very interesting and useful for my work. ... Read more

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Absurdism for Toddlers
This review is for the Harlin Quist 1970 1st Edition of 1970 hardback in English. Cloth over boards with a sewn binding. Color illustrations throughout.

This oddity was a surprise international hit for Ionesco, producing enough enthusiasm to spur the release of Story Number 3 and Story Number 4. (Yes, there is a Story Number 1.)

Here's a sample: "'No,' says Papa, 'because cheese isn't called cheese. It's called music box. And the music box is called a rug. The rug is called a lamp. the ceiling is called floor. The floor is called ceiling. The wall is called a door.'"

What we have here is a narrative with only the barest structures of plot, a babble of language, familiar and disarming, a seriousness and an impishness. Yup. We've got Ionesco.

Here his motives are apparently to unclothe the process of naming, to suggest that children know things not merely through learning their assigned names, but through repetition, through inquiry, through image. (The little girl's vision of what her mother looks like is a setpiece in itself "Mama has beautiful eyes, like two flowers. She has a mouth like a flower. She has a little pink nose, like a flower. She has hair like flowers. She has flowers in her hair.")

Delessert's illustrations are desirable in themselves: trippy and elegant delights -- a little Peter Max, a little Yellow Submarine, and a little Dora the Explorer -- sometimes tied to the text, sometimes not.

Urging the publisher to reprint this book!!!
Just having dug this book back up from my parents house. From all booksreading as a kid this one has left most impressions. Especially with thedrawings by Philippe Corentin. I would like to give it as a present toothers. I sincerly hope with all the other reviewers that this book will berepublished!

If you print it, they will buy.
These stories were an important part of my early adulthood and my children's development into thinking adults. They entertain by inducing the audience to "entertain the ideas." Reading these stories (orhaving them read to you) is no passive experience and can yield greatrewards in the joy of thinking. I believe the works of this series to behealthy mind food that eat like ice cream! I want these for mygranddaughter and my second childhood.Please reprint them...and in hardcover, heirloom editions.Even at twice the price, I would buyhalf-a-dozen.

UNFORGETTABLE
My husband and I read these books while sitting in a McDonald's 15 years ago.We were in high school just hanging out and a friend of mine had seen them on a clearance rack and picked them up.We BEGGED her to let us keepthem but she knew she had found something good.We laughed so hard wecried, and have never forgotten those books.Now we have 2 kids and I SOwish I had them to read to them!I always look for them in bookstores andhave never seen them.PLEASE reprint them, I must go to 15 baby showers ayear and would consider them a PERFECT gift, also for kids friendsbirthdays--I want these books!

These books are too wonderful to be extinct!
I must second the motion of other reviewers of this series. On my fourth birthday, I received Story Number Three, and it has remained my favorite children's book ever since. Today I am fortunate enough to be able to readit to my own son who adores it as much as I, but only because I have keptmy copy for 22 years. Story Number Three is a wonderful, original story,and the illustrations are like none I have ever seen in any otherpublication. It is rare that you find a children's book that is truly awork of art in every sense of the word, and rarer still that an artist ofIonesco's caliber has devoted his skill to the arena of children'sliterature. How tragic that the books themselves have become a rarity.Please put this series back in print so that I can read the rest of themand pass on more of something great to my little one! ... Read more

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Without ever leaving her parents' bed, Josette and her papa take a fantastic airplane ride to the moon and beyond. ... Read more

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the absurd at its best!
Ionesco promised to deliberately explore the post WW2 world by integrating the ABSURD (post-existentialist stream of thought) into the everyday life. He did it with such an ingenious way of portraying the lives of two bourgeouis couples who suffer the scandalous effects of WW2. By breaking all rules concerning grammar and the written way of expression as a means to justify the absurdity which lives inside of us and expressed orally with our "stream of consciousness". Pure genius on his writng skills, ionesco demonstrates just how far one can go just by simply observing the distortions of human relations when affected by dark historical moments... ... Read more

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Four plays for a penny (and $3.99 shipping)
...at that price, you're paying a dollar a play.That's almost (but not quite) as absurd as the plays contained in that four dollar figure!

If you're not familiar with Ionesco, he is the Romanian-born French playwrite who wrote absurd pieces he, early on, termed anti-plays.He is most often associated with The Theatre of the Absurd but he also served on the Academie Francais in the 1970s (the body that dictates the French language, among other things).

The four plays contained in this book (The Bald Soprano, The Lesson, The Submission, and Chairs) are strange, humourous, and sometimes forboding, are... typical of Ionesco's larger body of plays.I purchased a copy of this collection a few weeks ago for four dollars... worth it just so I can read Chairs over and over again!However, I wish this collection also contained the plays in their original French.Ah well. ... Read more