失败的艺术:贝克特戏剧中被中断的笑

The Art of Failure: The Stifled Laugh in Beckett’s Theater

在贝克特戏剧的演出中,观众会突然爆发出大笑,但是又会突然戛然而止。这是一种被中断的笑。这种突然爆发又突然中止的笑表现了文学作品和人类行为的相互影响。通过讨论喜剧与笑之间的关系,本文认为喜剧是由两种对立的因素之中一方的崩塌造成的,其结果就是笑。笑是身体对危机处境的回应,起到缓解紧张,摆脱困境的作用。本文以《等待戈多》和《终局》为例,分析了戏剧结构与观众的艺术体验之间的关系。在观看贝克特戏剧时,观众将自己投射进剧中,因此观众自己既是被表现事物的生产者同时又是接收者,这样一个去中心化的主体,以不断创造和否定意义的过程,使得自我与艺术本身一样成为一种体验。

During performances of Beckett’s plays, there are sudden bursts of laughter from the audience which ends as abruptly as they began. It is the stifled laugh, an example of the mutual influence of literary work and human behavior. Through the observations on the relation between comedy and laughter, it is understood that comedy is a toppling structure of two contradictory positions which results in laughter. Laughter is a crisis response by the body;it helps to release tension and escape from adversity. While watching Beckett’s plays, the spectator projects himself in the play. Thus, the spectator himself is, at one and the same time, the producer and the addressee of what is represented. This process makes it possible for a decentered subjectivity to be communicated as an experience of self in the form of projections continually created and rejected by the spectator.