Course Name: ELCP 05- Drama II: 19th-20th Century

Facilitator: Auswyn Winter Japang

ASSIGNMENT
Term Paper

Prepared by:
Arnab Sengupta
M.A. English Literature, Semester- II
S0MAELIT20200292
29/07/2021



Exploring Avant-Garde Elements in Luigi Pirandello!s Six Characters in Search

Arnab Sengupta
M.A. English Literature, Semester- II
English and Foreign Languages University, Regional Campus Shillong
Email: [email protected]
+91 7399128034

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Abstract

Luigi Pirandello’s Six Characters in Search of An Author is essentially studied as an absurdist

play, which borrows from the tradition of Commedia dell’arte. Pirandello’s play is a continuous

interpolation of reality and illusion. Pirandello as a playwright blurs the boundary between fantasy

and reality which develops into a discursive space, helping us explore the elements that are found in

Avant-garde theatre. This paper sets to explore the possible Avant-garde elements which are found

in the play. The tradition of Avant-garde theatre relies on experimentation which staunchly restricts

itself from following traditional Aristotelian norms of theatre. The play will be analysed by

considering Antonin Artaud’s Theatre of Cruelty which will bring forth the surreal, magical and

meta-theatrical aspects of the play. Artaud’s theory of cruelty is a break from realism and gives us

certain variables which will help us examine the play. This study also builds upon how Pirandello

has depicted the concept of self. The study of self becomes problematic as Pirandello believed that

achieving individuality is not possible. This delusion of identity has been portrayed in the play, thus

helping us with an existential reading, further building to the tradition of Avant-garde.

Keywords: Illusion and Reality, Commedia dell’arte, Avant-garde theatre, Antonin Artaud, Theatre

of Cruelty, Luigi Pirandello, Six Characters in Search of an Author

1. Introduction

“I think that life is a very sad piece of buffoonery because…we need to deceive ourselves

constantly by creating a reality (one for each and never the same for all), which from time to time is

discovered to be vain and illusory…My art is full of bitter compassion for all who deceive

themselves; but this compassion cannot fail to be followed by the cruel derision of destiny which

condemns men to deception.” Pirandello (qtd. in Leard 11)

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Dramaturgy of Luigi Pirandello becomes extremely difficult to give an accurate incite, as his

artistic craftsmanship lies in bringing together the facets of disjointed selves, fractured time, thus

breaching the epistemology of conventional theatre. For Pirandello, he draws upon two main

traditions to develop his dramaturgy. He borrowed from the tradition of Commedia dell’arte and

wrestled against the Italian form of naturalism, also known as Verismo.

The tradition of Commedia dell’arte can be traced back to sixteenth century Italy. The tradition

mostly relied on loud costumes, humour and improvisation to entertain the audience. This body of

theatrical phenomena eventually transformed into street theatre, thus eventually became a tool for

satirically depicting the politics of an age. Critics of the nineteenth century started to realise that,

“commedia is theatrical art at its pinnacle of expressiveness and creativity…The characters of

commedia thus became the expression of the universally human; to the modern mind the characters'

magic was powerful because it was a kind of street psychology, revealing directly who we humans

are.” (Fisher 496) This reincarnation of commedia dell’arte fortifies the effort to shift theatre from

realism towards a new form. Luigi Pirandello was a key dramatist to form this new theatrical

revolution. The dexterity of the playwright lies in improvising the traditional form of commedia

dell’arte to depict a synergy amongst the elements of illusion and reality, madness and sanity, the

comic and tragic.

Pirandello opposed the dominant trends of Italian theatre. He staunchly attacked the methods of

naturalistic theatre saying that it is a product of “bad writing” (Bassnett and Lorch 9). Émile Zola,

the founding figure of Naturalism, in his seminal essay on Naturalism argues that theatre should be

a “as close to life and as far from art—as possible” (Gerould 32) as the thematic representation

should be a faithful depiction of contemporary life. Pirandello, in his Preface to The Six Characters

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in Search of An Author, translated by Eric Bentley, expresses that, “it was never enough to present a

man or a woman and what is special and characteristic about them simply for the pleasure of

presenting them; to narrate a particular affair, lively or sad, simply for the pleasure of narrating it; to

describe a landscape simply for the pleasure of describing it. There are some writers (and not a few)

who do feel this pleasure and, satisfied, ask no more. They are, to speak more precisely, historical

writers. But there are others who, beyond such pleasure, feel a more profound spiritual need on

whose account they admit only figures, affairs, landscapes which have been soaked, so to speak, in

a particular sense of life and acquire from it a universal value. These are, more precisely,

philosophical writers. I have the misfortune to belong to these last.” (Pirandello 364)

Pirandello’s rejection of Verismo makes him an Avant-Garde man. Eugène Ionesco defines the

Avant-Garde man as someone who, “is the opponent of an existing system. He is a critic of, and not

an apologist for, what exists now. It is easy to criticise the past particularly when the prevailing

regime encourages you to do so; but this is only to sanctify ossification and kowtow to tyranny or

convention.” (Ionesco 45) Pirandello as an Avant-garde man can be further reified as Ionesco states

that, “The protestation of an Avant-garde dramatist can be a reaction against Realism when that is

the most prevalent and abused form of expression in the theatre; it can be a protest against a certain

Symbolism when that Symbolism has become abused, arbitrary, and no longer captures reality.”

(ibid 46)

Pirandello’s approach seems to be in favour of the Platonic ideals of art form. His understanding

of psychology was structured around the works of French experimental psychologist, Alfred Binet.

(Nesari et al. 897) So, Pirandello’s theatre prioritises a subjective approach to human emotions, thus

making his plays perplexing to our senses, which gives it a carnivalesque quality, as a consequence

making his plays evolve into a surreal and existential world. Pirandello as a playwright cannot be

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considered as an existentialist as the existential thinkers believed that life is essentially meaningless

and is devoid of purpose and meaning cannot be harnessed from one’s mundane existence. For

Pirandello, meaning lies in the abstract reality of life. It is to be noted that by the early 1900s,

people couldn’t counter the argument of a fragmented self and had surrendered to the idea that a

reified self did not exist. Reification of self no longer existed as the world was subject to

fragmentation.

His experimental style of dramaturgy greatly benefits and influences the tradition of Avant-garde.

It seems to anticipate the recurrent themes of reality and illusion, existential angst depicted in the

plays of Eugene Ionesco, Harold Pinter, Edward Albee and Eugene O’ Neill. When the play, Six

Characters in Search of An Author first appeared on stage in Rome in the year 1921, the audience

was baffled as it incites a deep sense of catharsis and bewilderment. This extreme vexation amongst

the audience led to riots. The spectators and critics expected a conventional realist play but failed to

comprehend the beginning and the end, the reality and the illusion. This continuous coherence and

interpolation of abstract elements is what makes us anticipate and trace the Avant-garde elements.

Eugéne Ionesco when describing Avant-garde theatre expresses that it is the theatre which

evolves from one’s own creative experience as “they are hardly normative, but rather descriptive”

(Ionesco 44) implying that it doesn’t follow any reified rules of theatre but rather relies on

experimentation which tends to reveal certain dramatic truths. Thus, in Ionesco’s terminology, it “…

is the theatre which is more literary, exacting and daring.” (ibid 45) The methodology of Avant-

garde theatre is considered to be unconventional when contrasted with the Aristotelian form of

theatre. This unconventionality of the Avant-garde theatre breaks the fourth wall, thus making the

audience an integral part of the play. Audience no longer remains passive but is usually subjected to

a state of introspection and vexation.

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Theatre of Cruelty, developed and theorised by Antonin Artaud becomes an important facet when

we trace the elements of Avant-garde theatre. In his seminal essay, No More Masterpieces, he

rejects the conventional mode of realist theatre as he says that they are just “Plots dealing with

money, money troubles, social climbing,” which are “anxiety, debauchery and lust before which we

are nothing but Peeping Toms gratifying our instincts”. (Artaud 55) Considering the modern

condition, Artaud argues that, “which used to sustain our lives no longer does so and we are all

mad, desperate and sick” which calls for “us to react.” (ibid 55) Artaud says that the objective of

theatre “…is not aimed at solving social or psychological conflicts…but to express objectively

secret truths, to bring out in active gestures those elements of truth hidden under forms in their

encounters with Becoming.” (ibid 50) In his manifesto, he discusses certain elements of what

theatre of cruelty essentially consists of. Such elements will be employed to further facilitate the

discussion on Pirandello’s Six Characters in Search of An Author.

2. Analysis

Aristotle’s Poetics defines six elements of tragedy which are essential constituents in the

construction of a tragic play. Aristotle says that plot is the most important part of a tragedy and it

must have a distinctive beginning, middle and an end. A plot must have a coherence between these

three parts of a plot. Aristotle concludes by saying that, “A well constructed plot, therefore, must

neither begin nor end at haphazard, but conform to these principles.” (Butcher 31) Considering

Pirandello’s Six Characters in Search of an Author it subverts every element of tragedy which

Aristotle mentions. When considering the plot, it doesn’t conform to the Aristotelian idea of a

beginning, middle and an end. As the play opens, the curtain of the stage is already up and there is

no set. The Actors of the company come in to rehearse Pirandello’s Rules of the Game. Pirandello

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breaches the convention of the Aristotelian plot when the six characters enter the stage and their

impromptu drama is introduced.

Aristotle goes on to define characterisation in a tragedy by saying that a character, most

importantly “must be good.” (ibid 53) Also, the tragedy must revolve around the primary character

of the play. The purpose of the characters is to make the action of the play progress. Aristotle

specifically mentions four fundamental values for a character to be moral. If the character is

immoral or inconsistent, “he must be consistently inconsistent” (ibid 55) meaning every character

must follow some form of a stock character. In Pirandello’s play, the six characters are incomplete

and they acknowledge the fact that they are just a product of the author’s imagination. Usually, in a

work of art, characters play a vital role as they become fixed and immutable. In this play, the six

characters desires to be whole as they seek for an author to write down the story which binds them,

thus giving them a surrealistic and existentialist trait. Since characters are inherently sunk in the pits

of existential dread, because of the drama that entails them they cannot be considered, in

Aristotelian terms “good.” (ibid 53)

The fourth element is Diction which is “the expression of our meaning in words” (ibid 29). The

dialogues and speeches must be able to reveal a hero's character by the choices he makes. The

dialogues in Pirandello’s play can be subject to uncertainty. The perplexing dialogues of the Father

who continuously questions the real and imaginary, puts the audience in a conflict of thought as

they are encountered with these mystifying questions on one’s existence. Fifth, is the element of

Thought which José Angel García Landa asserts that, “There is no place in Aristotle's theory for an

unconscious revelation of character. Character is made evident only in conscious and deliberate

moral choice.” (Garcia Landa 26) Aristotle when expounding on thought only considers the

dialogues which are part of the narrative. “Thought is included every effect which has to be

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produced by speech.” (Butcher 69) Aristotle refers to the speech acts of the characters, which are

associated with the plot, but not of the author who constructs the dialogues and speeches.

Considering Luigi Pirandello, and the sociopolitical conditions of the 1920s, he was an ardent

supporter of Mussolini. Pamela S. Loy critiques that “Fascism presented and continued to propose

itself as a cultural revolution that subscribed to the same anti-naturalist teachings that nourished

Pirandello’s writings.” (Loy 411) It gives us a deeper understanding with Pirandello’s employment

of masks in the play. Perhaps, the mask seems to masquerade the repressiveness of the fascist

regime, a form of hypocrisy and shallowness.

Spectacle refers to the setting, costume and special effects or rather the mode of representation.

The costumes of the six characters are in contrast to the actors. The characters wear dark costumes

with masks so that they appear as “created realities” or as “timeless creations of the imagination.”

(Pirandello 10) The monochromic costumes of the characters contrasts directly with the actors on

stage. Also, speaking of the setting there is no significant set or props used on the stage except when

the Stepdaughter discovers a revolver with the Little Boy which functions as Chekhov’s gun. 1 Song

is the final element of Aristotle’s tragedy. This element includes musical compositions and songs

which might be employed in a tragedy. In Pirandello’s play the play opens where the younger actors

and actresses are dancing to the sound of a piano which is "nearly hidden” (ibid 5). But this

sequence of action abruptly stops when the Stage manager comes in and demands silence.

Subverting Aristotelian norms of theatre makes us realise that Pirandello’s dramaturgy is beyond

norms and ideology. This non-conformity of tradition makes us look into the oeuvre of modern

theatre. Elements of modern Avant-garde theatre becomes synonymous when we talk of Antonin

1 Anton Chekhov wanted to convey that every element on the stage must have a significance and must be a
vital part of the plot construction.

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Artaud’s Theatre and its Double as every vital element of Avant-garde can be traced back to his

essays. To quote G. F. A. Gadoffre, Antonin Artaud’s “…works are at the cross-roads between two

diametrically opposite camps: the extreme anti-rationalists of the Living Theatre, pop culture,

junkies, anarchists on the one side, and the other super-rationalists of the new philosophical school

on the other.” (Gadoffre 336) Artaud wanted theatre to break from the realist tradition and return to

its Greek origins of myth, ritual and magic. To express the sentiments of what Artaud wanted to

create and break away from, William Blum says that, “Artaud's theater does not shun or minimize

the complexity of man, but shows and suggests to him everything he is, and impels him to

participate to the limits of his potentiality in the totality of his being. This totality includes

propensities destructive to life and society, and that is why this indulgence must occur within the

confines of the theater, where, although the experience has all the force and immediacy of actuality,

it is ineffectual, harmless, and cathartic.” (Blum 22)

In his seminal essay, No More Masterpieces, Artaud specifically mentions that the narratives

about money, “sexuality sugarcoated with an eroticism” should not be associated with theatre.

Artaud’s theatre should have the capability to produce catharsis in the audience. (Artaud 55) He

says that the audience should be in the centre, “while the show takes place around them. In such a

show there is continual amplification; the sounds, noises and cries are first sought for their vibratory

qualities, secondly for what they represent.” (ibid 58) Artaud wanted his audience to be infected, so

that they are provoked. Theatre should be an experience of extremity. To Artaud, his theatre should

be able to induce a germ of revolt. In Pirandello’s Six Characters in Search of An Author, the

element of sonority is clearly evident in Act Three. The Son says that as he was going to rescue the

Little Girl he saw the Little Boy “standing there with a mad look in his eyes.” (ibid 74) The

Stepdaughter after discovering the Little Girl starts to sob pathetically as her sob transforms like an

echo. Just as the Son continues his narrative, they hear the sound of the revolver from behind the

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trees. The Mother gushes out with a burst of “terrible cry” (ibid 74) which causes a state of

commotion and uncertainty. This particular scene evokes catharsis in the audience as they are in a

state of flux if it's the reality or just an illusion. This sense of chaos is further intensified when the

Leading Actor says that “It’s all make-believe. It’s a sham! He’s not dead.” But the other actors

protest that its “…Real! He’s dead!” (ibid 75) There is a complex conflict in the narrative and the

reality when the Little Boy dies. Artaud says that “Violent, concentrated action is like lyricism; it

calls forth supernatural imagery, a bloodshed of images, a bloody spurt of images inside the poet’s

head as well as in the audience’s.” (Artaud 59) Here the spectators or the readers are mystified,

bewildered and left in a trance-like state as Pirandello creates a sequence of events which were not

expected thus leading to a state of catastrophe. The audience at this point are expected to be

completely bewildered as they fail to grasp the reality of what has been transpiring on the stage.

In the second act of the play, the appearance of the supposed ‘seventh’ character startles the

Actors on stage. The Actors on stage set up the workshop for Madam Pace. 2 The Father mimics the

reality of their story by hanging hats, coats, scarfs of the actors on the racks to imitate the reality.

The Father says that “if we dress the set better, she will be drawn by the articles of her trade and,

who knows, she may even come to join us.” (Pirandello 42) It so happens that Madam Pace

magically conjures up and enters the downstage. This sudden appearance of Madam Pace startles

the Producer and the actors which makes them “jump off the stage with cries of fear” (Pirandello

42). The appearance of Madam Pace jolts the actors and the Producer because for them, it seems

that the illusionary characters have conjured up another life-form. The disbelief is evident when the

Leading Actress exclaims, “It’s a game, a conjuring trick!” (ibid 43) The appearance of Madam

Pace gives the play a surreal and magical quality.

2 Madam Pace, in the play is a brothel-keeper in the play, who disguises her occupation as a dressmaker. She
is the only character who has been given a name. She becomes an internal part of the character’s story as her
make-believe appearance sets the action forward.

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Artaud also says that lighting “…is made not only to give colour or to shed light, but containing

its own force, influence and suggestiveness.” (Artaud 58) In Act Three, the producer in the end

commands that the stage lights be turned on and the entire auditorium is flooded with harsh

lighting. This bright light seems to bring a sigh of relief from the state of uncertainty that they were

encountering. The Producer laments that they have “lost a whole day’s work” (Pirandello 75) and

commands to kill the lights which leaves the entire stage pitch dark. This is followed by a source of

green light which produces a “…sharp shadow of the Characters, but without the Little Boy and the

Little Girl.” (ibid 75) This surreal image hints towards the presence of the supernatural as it is seen

that The Producer “jumps off the stage, terrified.” (ibid 75) This further disrupts the space between

reality and illusion as the fourth wall no longer exists.

Also, in the first act, when the six characters enter the stage, Pirandello mentions that it is

necessary to distinguish the characters from the actors. “A tenuous light surrounds them, almost as

if irradiated by them – the faint breath of their fantastic reality. This light will disappear when they

come forward towards the actors. They preserve, however, something of the dream lightness in

which they seem almost suspended.” (Pirandello 214) Since the characters are a created reality of an

author’s imagination, they are supposed to have a dream-like effect when they enter the stage. This

evokes a surreal cathartic feeling in the audience as they seem to encounter the fantasy and the

reality on stage, thus appearing to be magical.

The play doesn’t have a conventional start, instead there is a sense of chaos between the Stage

Manager and the Stage-hand. Audience do not realise that the play has already started as the

curtains are kept up. There is no visible set on stage. We only see a few chairs scattered around and

a small table and a chair downstage for the Producer. This lack of props on stage sets out the

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costumes of the Characters and the Actors. In the original Italian version of the play, it was not

divided into three Acts but the division is seen on stage when the Producer and the Characters go

off-stage to form the plot of their story, and then later when the Producer lowers the curtain, leaving

the apron on front. (Pirandello 15) The Producer and the Father go through the curtain together

further breaking the fourth wall and the reality.

To achieve the essence of cruelty and metaphysical torment Artaud in his essay Theatre of

Cruelty (First Manifesto) mentions that “every show will contain physical, objective elements

perceptible to all. Shouts, groans, …masks, abrupt lighting changes” (Artaud 66) must be part of the

theatre. The Characters in the play wear masks which distinguishes them from the actors present on

the stage. In the stage direction, Pirandello writes that “the masks are designed to give the

impression of figures constructed by art, each one fixed for ever in its own fundamental emotion.”

(Pirandello 10) The appearance of the Mothers’s mask has “wax tears in the corners of the eyes”

(ibid 10) suggesting grief. Artaud says that characters are symbolic representative of ideas.

Similarly every character represents a fixed fundamental emotion. The Father is fixed with the

emotion of remorse, Stepdaughter with the emotion of revenge and scorn for the Son. The masks

that people were in the society are subject to change but in the play, the masks are immutable and

fixed.

Plato’s Republic speaks of the famous allegory of the cave. 3 Laura Sara Agrati asserts that, “The

allegory is related to Plato’s ‘Theory of forms’, according to which the ‘forms’ (or ‘ideas’), and not

3 This myth describes cave dwellers who have never experienced the outside world and has been forever
facing a blank wall. Sometimes the cavemen gets to witness shadows or mere phantoms of the objects that
are near them. When one of the cave dwellers manage to escape and experiences the outside world, he gets to
experience the true nature of reality. The mere phantoms are the cavemen’s reality and they cannot see
anything beyond that and the free cave dweller has the ability to contemplate the true nature of art form.

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the material world known to us through sensation, possess the highest and most fundamental kind

of reality”. (Agratti 1) In Pirandello’s play, the characters are the illusion and their identity is not

complete, so they can be imagined to be chained up like the cavemen shackled by the legs and neck.

Hoover W. Clark asserts that, “A character in a work of art, once the work is complete is fixed,

immutable.” (Clark 279) In the play, the characters will get their fixed identities when they find an

author. It can also be noticed that the characters, especially the Father is very sensitive to the word,

illusion. In Act Three, the Father remarks, “An Illusion? For pity’s sake don’t talk about illusions!

Don’t use that word, it’s especially hurtful to us!” (Pirandello 61)

Artaud argues that, “…theatre must become a kind of experimental manifestation of the deep-

seated identity between the abstract and the concrete.” (Artaud 77) The imaginary lives of the

characters certainly seem more real than anything envisioned by the real Actors, thus surreal. So, as

action transpires on the stage, Actors try to imitate the hyperreal, that is the act of the six characters,

while the characters imitate their reality. H.W. Clark suggests that when a dramatic character is

created, their essence precede their existence. (Clark 277) The characters in the play have been

defined before they exist as they are only a product of the authors imagination. Tragedy in this play

arises when an individual confronts themselves as other see them. Pirandello in the play makes use

of the analogy of the mirror, showcasing a figment of illusion. In the third act, the Son replies back

to the Producer when he says that he should be grateful that the actors are paying him a lot of

attention, to which he says that the Characters could go on living with a mirror held up in front of

them that would not only freeze their reflection forever but fix them in a reflection that they

wouldn’t even recognise as their own. (Pirandello 72) It is through one’s suffering that one comes to

an understanding of the inner self. Suffering becomes unbearable when one confronts the absurdity

of life. The self of the characters are fragmented due to which they have not been named. Being

trapped in existence, but failing to achieve the purpose of one’s being; herein lies the existential

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torment of the six characters. The six characters fail to find an author to complete them. They

exercise their own degree of freedom as they are not capable of achieving their own essence.

3. Conclusion

Twentieth century dramatists destabilised the grand narratives that were at work in the discourse of

dramaturgy. The grand narratives of realism no longer was compatible with the tumultuous changes

that were causing a havoc in the society. Avant-garde was the canon of experimentation through

which playwrights and dramatists experimented with the form and techniques of dramaturgy. This

abstract experimentation took place as the traditional norms of dramaturgy couldn’t express the

entanglement and distress experienced in the modern life.

Luigi Pirandello is one such dramatist who experimented with the Italian theatre. Six Characters in

Search of an Author becomes emblematic of the discursive space of the Avant-garde theatre. The

incongruous nature of the play is what exasperates the reader or the audience. Pirandello’s play

clearly disregards the conventions of Aristotelian norms of tragedy. Artaud heavily relies upon three

basic elements belonging to the Greek dramatical tradition which are magic, myth and ritual. Ritual

can also be an enactment of a certain event. In the play, the scene enactment of Madam Pace’s

parlour anticipates the grotesque near-incest and the morbid climax of the play involving the Boy

and the Little Girl which seems to be a ritualised act.

These various climactic scenes also show us how trauma is being relived by the characters which is

especially evident when we witness spasmodic outbursts by the characters. Also, the remorse in the

Mother aggravates when she encounters the surreal scene involving the Father and the Step-

daughter. For the Mother, the enactment on the stage by the characters is real and not a theatrical

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performance or a rehearsal. This is the only reason why she is not able to restrain herself from her

episodic vexation. The sudden mystical appearance of Madam Pace is perceived by the actors and

the Producer to be an act of necromancy. They fail to fathom the fact that characters of illusion

conjure up a make-believe real character. Using Artaud’s theorised lens, it has helped us reveal the

various states of displeasure that the actors and the characters go through, the lingering presence of

a cacophony, friction between reality and illusion, distortion of the self, thus qualifying it as an

Avant-garde play.

4. References

1. Agrati, Laura Sara. "Plato’s Myth of the Cave Images. A Didactic Analysis of the Mediation

Function." Proceedings 1.9 (2018): 1-8. Web

2. Artaud, Antonin. The Theatre and its Double. Trans. Victor Corti. Croydon: Alma Classics, 2013.

Web

3. Bassnett, Susan., and Jennifer Lorch, eds. Luigi Pirandello in the Theatre. New York: Routledge,

2013. Web

4. Blum, William. "Toward a Cinema of Cruelty." Cinema Journal 10.2 (1971): 19-33. Web

5. Butcher, S. H. The Poetics of Aristotle. London: Macmillan, 1898. Web

6. Clark, Hoover W. "Existentialism and Pirandello's Sei Personaggi." Italica 43.3 (1966): 276-84.

Web

7. Fisher, James. "An Author in Search of Characters: Pirandello and Commedia dell'arte." Modern

Drama 35.4 (1992): 495-512. Web

8. Gadoffre, G. F. "Antonin Artaud and the Avant-Garde Theatre." Bulletin of the John Rylands

Library 53.2 (1971): 329-36. Web

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9. Garcia Landa, José Angel. "Aristotle's Poetics." SSRN Electronic Journal (2004). Web

10. Gerould, Daniel, ed. Theatre / Theory / Theatre: The Major Critical Texts from Aristotle and

Zeami to Soyinka and Havel. New York: Applause, 2003. Web

11. Ionesco, Eugène. "The Avant-Garde Theatre." The Tulane Drama Review 5.2 (1960): 44-53.

Web

12. Leard, Joseph Glenn. “A Set and Lighting Design For Pirandello's Six Characters in Search of

an Author.” MA thesis. Texas Tech University, 1974. 2-99. Web

13. Nesari, Ali Jamali., Shadi Shahraz, Nabieh Filinezhad, and Shamsaldin Jamali Nesari. “A Study

of The Lack of Identity in Luigi Pirandello‘s Six Characters in Search of an Author and Henry IV.”

Procedia - Social and Behavioral Sciences 28 (2011): 896–99. Web

14. Pirandello, Luigi. Naked Masks. Trans. Eric Bentley. New York: E.P. Dutton, 1952. Web

15. Pirandello, Luigi. Six Characters in Search of an Author. Trans. John Linstrum. New Delhi:

Bloomsbury, 2014. Print