The Alienated Man-A Study Of Samuel Beckett's Major Plays

In the 50s and 60s of 20^th century, the Irish dramatist Samuel Beckett presented several avant-garde plays visualizing people's living and psychological conditions in the post-war Western world. Beckett abandoned the traditional treatment of dramatic ingredients and in doing so gave birth to a new theatre - Theatre of the Absurd. His dramatic works are filled with deep concerns for men's being. The thesis aims to analyze Samuel Beckett's plays using an existential concept - alienation, emphasizing the metaphysical concern for the meaning of men's being.The major and relatively long plays: Waiting for Godot, Endgame, Happy Days, and Krapp's Last Tape etc. are analyzed in this thesis. How the concept of "alienation" is embodied through the arrangement of plot, characterization, language, action and settings are elaborated.Existentialists thought that alienation comes between men and the outside, between men and others, even between men and the self. Through his dramatic works, Beckett directly stated the three layers of men's alienation together with the absurdity of the world and the helplessness of men. Beckett tries to reveal to people the predicament of human in the psychological sphere. Through the irrational and confusing stage images, he brings shock to the people in an inhuman circumstance caused by the civilization of technology, drawing people's consideration and concern for the absurd world and for themselves.