Six Characters in Search of an Author

"Six Characters in Search of an Author" (1921) created Luigi Pirandello’s international reputation in the 1920s and is still the play by which he is most widely identified.

With originality that was startling to his contemporaries, Pirandello introduced a striking and compelling dramatic situation that initially baffled but eventually dazzled audiences and critics alike.

The comedy, written in Italian, helped lay the foundation for the Theatre of the Absurd, a literary genre popular in the second half of the twentieth century. Absurdist drama presents life as meaningless, nonsensical, and comic. It may also allow unreality to exist in the real world.

The story follows a theatre company that is interrupted by the arrival of six characters from an unfinished drama, with the remainder of the play blurring the line between fiction and reality and drawing attention to the nature of theatrical dramas.

"Six Characters in Search of an Author" is a parody of the “well-made play.” All theatrical conventions and functions of personnel are examined in the play-within-the-play, which operates on different temporal planes.