Rhinoceros

"Eugéne lonesco (1912-1994) was an important figure in the 'New Drama' that emerged in France/Europe in the first half of the twentieth century, and flowered fully in the century's third quarter. The whole movement received a kick-start with Alfred Jarry's Ubu Roi (1896), and through its various mutations embracing dadaism, surrealism, anti theatre movement, etc. kept its distance from 'realistic' dramaturgy. In India, because of a set of circumstances, Ionesco has been known as an 'absurdist' playright. In Europe, 'absurd drama' is not a description of everybody's choice; 'avant-garde drama', 'anti-play', 'New Drama' and other names have been given to it. One of the things this edition of Rhinoceros tries to do is to draw the reader's attention to these choices. Ionesco hated 'thesis plays', a (politically) committed theatre. Though he once wrote almost a thesis play on dramatic art, it is only in Rhinocéros, the play which made him internationally famous amongst the ordinary theatre-goers, that he broke his own rules: 'politics' is writ large on this play's face. Through Ionesco's own non-dramatic prose, through interviews with him and reviews of play, this volume offers its readers a contour of the controversy surrounding the political meanings of this play written during the Cold War period. Dilip K. Basu is a theatre-activist, and teaches English at Rajdhani College, Delhi University."