WHEN ARAB DRAMA REDEFINES THE FRENCH THEATEROF THE ABSURD: A COMPARATIVE STUDY OF AL HAKIM S THE TREE CLIMBER AND SAMUEL BECKETT S WAITING FOR GODOT

Many great authors and playwrights from different countries have attempted to portray the decline of humanity and loss of identity, which are the features of the life of modern man in the twentieth century. Despite the fact that there have been many studies of absurd philosophy, literature, and drama, there has been almost no investigation of the similarities and differences in Western and Eastern literature in respect to the Theater of the Absurd. Although playwrights have attempted to expose their own conception of the absurd, within a comparative framework significant similarities across diverse cultures can be identified. The current study intends to reveal a number of certain fundamental similarities between Samuel Beckett’s Waiting for Godot (1956) and Tawfiq Al-Hakim’s The Tree Climber in terms of common absurdist features. Therefore, benefitting from the theories of the French and American schools of comparative literature, the current study attempts to offer common understanding of the absurd in the two selected plays

Keywords:

Comparative literature , the Theater of the Absurd , Arabic drama , Waiting for Godot , The Tree Climber