Full transcript
0:00The A to Z of -isms...
0:02Absurdism... Most philosophical -isms are attempts to make sense of the world.
0:07Who are we? Why are we? What's the point? And so on. But one -ism wastes no time on
0:13this topic at all. It's called absurdism. In answer to the question, "What is the meaning
0:20of life?" Absurdism says, there isn't any. No meaning. No point. No worries. Life is
0:28pointless. Existence is meaningless, and look how many peas I have in this pan. Absurdism
0:33was pioneered by the Danish philosopher, Søren Kierkegaard, who said that, "As the reality
0:37of God is beyond human comprehension, it is absurd for humans to have faith in God." In
0:43the 20th Century, absurdists removed the concept of God entirely from the equation, choosing
0:49to make meaning and meaninglessness an entirely human issue. Albert Camus believed that, as
0:55life is meaningless, we can have one of two responses. We can end it all or we can find
0:59our own meaning. It doesn't matter. You can, as one of his characters does, spend your
1:04life transferring peas from one pan to another. Or you can jump off a bridge. It's all the
1:09same thing. Life is absurd, say the absurdists. There is no God, so there is no point. But
1:15they go on to say, "that's fine". Absurdism is an -ism whose influence has been strong
1:21in the arts. The idea that nothing has meaning is a liberating one, particularly in areas
1:26like literature and drama which have traditionally been all about the search for meaning. Most
1:33notably, absurdism spawned the Theatre of the Absurd, probably the only theatrical movement
1:38inspired by philosophy. The Theatre of the Absurd gave us the French writer, Eugène
1:44Ionesco, whose play Rhinoceros was about the dangers of conformity and featured a lot of
1:50rhinoceroses. The Irish genius, Samuel Beckett,whose work is less rhinoceros-based, and the British
1:56writer, NF Simpson,who wasn't really an absurdist at all but is very, very funny indeed, especially
2:01in his absurd masterpiece A Resounding Tinkle. Beckett, by the way, could also be very serious
2:09and, as for Ionesco, the critic, Kenneth Tynan, famously once said, "Once you have seen all
2:15of Ionesco's plays, you have seen one of them." Which is absurd, but true. Just like absurdism.
2:25Absurdism suits comedy in fact because the best comedy is essentially absurdist - and
2:30perhaps this is why absurdism will never really go away.