Life crisis and existentialism in three dramatic works

The purpose of this thesis is to provide a new approach to the existential dilemma of the self in crisis as it emerges in three modern plays. While scrutinizing how a person can remain human in a universe filled with obstacles, I show that the idea of the life crisis provides the most suitable approach to that predicament. The idea of the life crisis allows for a comprehensive approach when applied to the various quandaries that situate the shifting idea of freedom. In this thesis, the philosophical ideas of Soren Kierkegaard, John-Paul Sartre, and Albert Camus will be taken up to demonstrate the role of the life crisis in Anton Chekhov’s The Seagull, Henrik Ibsen’s Hedda Gabler, and Tawfiq al-Hakim’s The Tree Climber. In focusing on the life crisis as it emerges in modern drama, I demonstrate how human identity can be better understood--and how it either becomes coherent or dissolves