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Title: Rhinoceros
Author: Eugène Ionesco
Genre: play
Rating: 
This is what Ionesco himself says about his play (translated):
It's not even a satire: it's the fairly objective description of a process of inflammation,
of a development of a totalitarianism that's spreading, that propagates,
captures, that's changing a world. And this world will be totally changed
because after all it's about totalitarianism.
The play is about people changing into rhinoceroses. At first there are only a
few, but in a few hours time there are more rhinoceroses than there are humans
left. At first the characters don't know why these changes are happening, but as
the play progresses the main character Bérenger notices that the change is made
voluntarily. People are curious about what is new, so they want to know what it
is to be a rhinoceros. After that they just want to be part of something, don't
want to be an outsider, so if they see that the world is changing around them,
they change with it. After the change all the people look the same, they lost
their individuality to be part of something greater. Only Bérenger stays a
human, he wants to be an individual, keep thinking for himself. He doesn't go
with the communal hysteria that captures the people around him. His last words
are: I don't capitulate!
Although Ionesco's way is absurd (humans changing into rhinoceroses), he gets
the message across loud and clear. He describes the process what happened i.e.
during WO II. He also makes it very clear that it can happen to everybody
everywhere.
Translated from the French I've read this play in Dutch, but I don't think that
had any effect on the story told. It was just brilliant.
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