There is something to Phillip Lopate that may make his followers feel particularly close to him, as if his work were known solely by them and a select few others; that this is not true, that he is in fact an immensely respected writer and scholar, would seem of little importance to these readers.

As with any movement of which its title and ideological thrust is foisted unwittingly and often unwarrantedly upon its supposed members, the Theater of the Absurd is as awkward and uneasy a fit for Eugène Ionesco's literary and artistic endeavors as they are for Samuel Beckett or Jean Genet