Absurdist names a style of theatre that grew in the 1950s, with writers such as Samuel Beckett and Eugène Ionesco. The plays do not work like old-fashioned drama, where people talk, a problem is solved, and the story closes neatly. Here the characters speak, but they often fail to reach each other; lines may loop, stall, or refuse to add up. The feeling the work leaves you with is that human life has no clear meaning or purpose, and that there is no God handing out a script. Though actually, the school-book version is a little tidier than the plays themselves: some are bleaker, some are darkly funny, and not every writer is preaching the same lesson in the same voice. What they share is a stage where talk is broken and waiting, habit, and nonsense do more work than a tidy plot. In everyday English, absurd just means silly or unreasonable. Absurdist, in this sense, is a serious artistic label, even when the play makes you laugh. You can also call a writer in this line an Absurdist, and you can use it as an adjective: an Absurdist play, Absurdist humour.