This book is awesome! Though, I haven't finished it, I'm loving it so far. Witty and hilarious - I think I just like existential/absurd books in general, because I haven't felt this good about a book since Slaughter House - Five.
R&G are dead is a play, which, if you've read Hamlet (and even if you haven't, I suppose), follows around the very minor characters, Rosencrantz and Guildenstern, and tells the story of Hamlet from their perspective, in a sense, as they spend the majority of their down time trying to make sense out of everything. And by everything, I refer even to their very purpose in life. However, they never really seem to get very far. I don't believe that I'd be giving anything away if I said that they're at times philisophical and critical, but they always fail in finding meaning, because of some unknown internal or external force. And, as in many absurdist literature, they also spend a good amount of their time playing games or engaging in repetitive and meaningless tasks.
In any case, that's not why it's so good. haha In Hamlet, you find that these characters are almost indestinguishable, and serve very little purpose in play as whole (which was why the author, Tom Stoppard, decided to write the play in the first place), as, when they do actually die, the audience doesn't even get to see it. In fact, they don't even know that they're dead for sure until that guy, whose title escapes me, comes in with Fortinbras and says "Rosencrantz and Guildenstern are dead." However, in the Stoppard play, they're actually very easily destinguished between one another to the audience, but they themselves actually have difficulty with their own identities. For instance, Ros will answer to either Ros or Guil, because he doesn't know who he is. He knows he's one of them, and even contemplates the probability of being both of them, but can't destinguish himself from his companion.
There are so many elements to it, and I'm really not even that far in. If you've read Hamlet, then this is a must read, I think. And if you haven't, then go read Hamlet and the R&G are Dead. haha Has anyone read it?
