The Absentee Author and the Plane of Understanding in Six Characters in Search of an Author

Abstract

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The study explores how the characters in Luigi Pirandello’s play Six  Characters in Search of An Author expose the limiting and conventional frames of understanding that fetter the imaginations of both theatrical actors and their audience. In general, when watching a play on a stage, conventional theatre-goers are usually rigid conformists who seek the validation of preconceived notions nurtured by their subjective planes of understanding. When such notions are challenged by modern dramatists like Pirandello, who dissolve the division between theatrical action and the audience, the audience feels displaced from their secure planes of understanding. Pirandello’s metatheatre evokes a poignant conscious response from his audience who had to become participants in stage action due to the authorial absence. Subsequently, rather than rejecting a play that shifts their secure coordinates of existence, the audience must construct meaning based on their varied versions of understanding. In a self-reflective stance induced by the play, the modern audience realizes that identities, meanings, and representations are not absolute. Hence, the aforementioned realization highlights the limitation of conventional frames of understanding, which not only hinders the performance of actors but also limits the understanding of the play itself.

Keywords: actors; author; characters; understanding; reality; theatre