Christopher Hampton : influence of the first wave and historically important playwrights

This thesis shows how Christopher Hampton was influenced by the First Wave playwrights; John Osborne, Shelagh Delaney, Arnold Wesker, John Arden, and Brendan Behan; and historically important playwrights Moliere and Pirandello. Influences of character treatment, thematic development, and language and style are discussed within the paper. Hampton's five full-length plays, When Did You Last See My Mother? (1967), Total Eclipse (1969), The Philanthropist (1970), Savages (1974), and Treats (1976), are compared with selected plays of the aforementioned playwrights.

Influences of character treatment examined are: the angry young man, the mother/incest character, the misplaced homosexual, the passive acceptor, the misguided activist, and influences of three characters in Moliere's Misanthrope. The influences of thematic development, treated in the following chapter, are: the danger of apathy, the importance of honesty, responsibility for protection, the importance of politics, the misfit in society, the importance of appearances, and the importance of fidelity. The final chapter, concerned with influences of language and style, examines caustic language, use of the song, and the play-within-the-play. The paper concludes with a brief summary.