In his play Only the End of the World Jean-Luc Lagarce presented a most distressing and most tragic apocalyptic picture of modern man.
Through a subtle dramatic analysis of a middle-class family, “successor of French kings”, and through an analysis of their human and family relations, this great successor of Becket and Camus succeeded in deconstructing classical civil drama by introducing into it elements of modern drama - alienation, absurdity, absence of contact and communication - intensifying to the utmost the feeling of anguish, misery and death ...
We have in front of our eyes the closest members of a family who are, after many years, during a short encounter, desperately trying to recognize each other and become close again. But they do not know each other any more, they do not love each other, they are complete strangers ... In this artificial encounter Lagarce has exposed the entire history and all myths of the modern world. He carefully selects and varies emotional and intellectual angles of vision. Scenes, pictures, moments, silence and words replace one another. Long monologues are followed by shorts dialogues. Lagarce suggests and deepens the feeling of complete loneliness and alienation in the given situation. In this loveless world there is no need for a nuclear, natural or any other disaster brought about from without. Man is decaying from within in fear and in shivers. Without a scream. This Lagarce’s imploring prayer, poetical oratory or whisper on his death-bed, miraculously shaped into a great and confessional drama, distressingly echoes throughout the universe. In the end of the drama, he reminds us that life does not pass, but just elapses into oblivion that we shall long for.

Milica NOVKOVIC