On The Indeterminacy Of Theme And Character In Rosencrantz And Guildenstern Are Dead

Rosencrantz and Guildenstern Are Dead is one of the most famous works of English playwright Tom Stoppard; it is also considered as one of the most successful adaptations of Shakespeare’s Hamlet. To a degree Stoppard transformed Hamlet from a revenge tragedy into an Absurd drama. The two minor characters in Shakespeare’s play, Rosencrantz and Guildenstern, are thrown into a world that apparently far beyond their understanding; this play describes their confusion and doubt towards their new world. Rosencrantz and Guildenstern, the two marginal figures go to the central of the stage, but their tragic ending has not changed. The two courtiers cannot run from their ultimate fate—death. This thesis tends to analysis the play from the postmodern perspective and tries to find out the postmodernist feature of indeterminacy in this play.The thesis consists of five chapters. The first chapter is the introduction of Tom Stoppard and his creation of Rosencrantz and Guildenstern Are Dead. Chapter two summarizes the researches on Stoppard’s works at home and abroad, then presents the theoretical background of Ihab Hassan’s postmodern theory. Indeterminacy is a important symbol of postmodernist, it reflects the mental state of people in the postmodern society. In Hassan’s theory, indeterminacy spreads all over our actions, thoughts and interpretations. It constitutes our world. In the postmodernist literature, indeterminacy becomes the creative principle of writing.In the main body of the thesis—chapter three—the author starts with the analysis on the indeterminacy of the theme in Rosencrantz and Guildenstern Are Dead. Owing to the indeterminacy feature, the theme is changing all the time from the different background, characters and plots. The theme of struggle against fate is discussed first, in the Rosencrantz and Guildenstern Are Dead, Rosencrantz and Guildenstern always try their best to escape from the invisible hand which controls them. However, they do not know that the invisible hand is their fate, no matter how hard they try they cannot avoid their fixed fate. Then the author discusses the theme of the existence and death of human beings. The author of the thesis thinks that Stoppard gives his thought of existence and death in his work. Stoppard on one hand gives Rosencrantz and Guildenstern souls to think, but on the other hand deprives their existence of their world and only makes them exist as two actors who has to receive their duties in their world.Chapter four analyzes the indeterminacy of the characters. It is divided into two parts:the first is the ambiguity of character. Here the thesis writer mainly discusses the two heroes—Rosencrantz and Guildenstern. Their image of ambiguity is quite typical. Stoppard has no description of their background, what is more, other characters in this play cannot distinguish them; in the second part, the author of this thesis analyzes the parody of the characters with two famous drama Waiting for Godot and Hamlet.By the analysis on the indeterminacy of the theme and character of Rosencrantz and Guildenstern Are Dead, the author of this thesis thinks this play is not only an adaption of the traditional classics, but also offers an new vison of those classical works. Stoppard gives audience a chance to notice the minor character’s helplessness and sorrow. His subversion of traditional play also shed new lights on traditional theatre.