Born in Romania, he studied in Paris at the age of 26 and settled down. He had never written a play before he was 40 years old. Until 1950, his first play, The Bald Soprano, premiered in France. There were only three spectators at that time, and the response was very cold. It was not until later, with the support of some playwrights and drama critics, that his plays were widely concerned.
His plays were not accepted in the early days. Because of his antipathy to western traditional drama, he thinks that "life is like a dream", and realism and language are no longer competent to express the helplessness and predicament of modern people. Therefore, he put forward the theory of "anti-drama", using fragmented and absurd characters and plots to express the theme, belittling the role of language, making objects and props play roles and creating absurd stage effects. His works describe the tragic fate of victims in absurd reality, and reveal the emptiness of human spiritual life and various contradictions of existence.
Later, he put his skills into practice and wrote nearly forty works, such as Class, Chair, Lessons of Duty, Black Boy, Rhino, Quitting the King and so on. 1970 was awarded as an academician of the French Academy.
Famous saying:
Ideology separates us, but dreams and pain bring us together.
What is enlightening is not the answer, but the question.