الفهرس 
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Abstract
In her article ”Postmodernism” , Dr. Mary Klages, an associate professor of English at Colorado University, states that modern and postmodern thought and art face much criticism because a postmodern play is characterized by fragmentation, disorder, and loose content. That is why most people do not appeal to this kind of drama. Klages says: ”postmodern art (and thought) favor reflexivity and self-consciousness, fragmentation and discontinuity (especially in narrative structures), ambiguity, simultaneity, and an emphasis on the destructured, decentered, dehumanized subject”. Therefore, a postmodern drama suffers a dilemma which stretches to its following ideology known as Metamodernism and this dilemma is the one which enhances the idea for this dissertation.
The term “Contemporary Drama” is synonymous with the drama of postmodernism with its characteristics of fragmentation, loss of identity, surface characters, and loose thematic concerns, and its following ideology of post-postmodernism or metamodernism which tries to add some balance and rationality to the concepts of postmodernism without forsaking them. Within such drama it is very difficult to categorize a play as being a well-constructed drama because postmodern drama denies order and approves chaos.Therefore, Metamodernism or post-postmodernism starts to appear in a way to create some balance that enables the drama to enjoy some order and some constructed rational endings.
The dissertation is a study of three contemporary plays with different thematic concerns, with the aim to prove the applicability of postmodern Chaos Theory to the drama of Postmodernism and its following Metamodernism. These plays are John Guare’sSix Degrees of Separation (1990), Tammy Ryan’s Soldier’s Heart (2013), and Mike Bartlett’s King charles III (2014).
The beginning of chaos as a science started in mathematics and physics in the early 1960s and 1970s. And though it started in mathematics it found its echo in literature. Many critics approved the existence of Chaos Theory in literature, for example N. Katherine Hayles in her book Chaos Bound: Orderly Disorder in Contemporary Literature and Science proves the relationship between Chaos Theory and the literature of Postmodernism (Preface xiii). She also says: ’’Just as new methods were being developed within the physical sciences to cope with the complexities of nonlinear systems, so new ways of reading and writing about literature were coming to the fore in critical theory’’ (2). That is why Hayles created her book in order to ”trace these developments in literature and science and locate them within postmodern culture, particularly within the technologies and social landscapes created by the concept of information” (Hayles xiii).
Through applying Chaos theory to the selected contemporary plays the dissertation refutes the postmodern and metamodern thought that approves disorder and chaos, and proves that order is the origin of every chaos. Through applying chaos theory to the selected plays, the dissertation emphasizes that though contemporary drama embraces disorder, fragmentation, and chaos, these chaos and disorder are in fact ordered chaos and ordered disorder. Also this drama holds in itself a discernible order that proves that order is the origin of everything.
Thereafter, the research depends on applying Chaos Theory to the three selected contemporary plays, in the light of equating Chaos Theory with plot development, and in the light of showing how Chaos Theory can work as a dramatic plot that carries the theme of the play. A plot is considered the skeleton upon which a well-constructed drama is based. Therefore, through applying the theory to the selected plays the study proves that order is the origin of every chaos. The characteristics of Chaos Theory are very close to the nonlinear development of a plot. Though a postmodern and a metamodern drama embrace disorder, there must be a plot for a play to be based on. And any plot should have an exposition that is followed by a conflict, a climax, and a resolution. The dissertation shows how Chaos Theory can be applied to the plays as plots for these plays through which they can deliver their ideas and thematic concerns.
The first play tackled in the dissertation is John Guare’s Six degrees of Separation (1990). As a talented American Playwright, Guare was awarded many prizes. For instance, he received the Obie award for his play Muzeeka, and The New York Drama Critics Circle Award for his play House of Blue Leaves (Cattano). Six degrees of Separation was awarded The New York Drama Critics Circle Award and Laurence Oliver Award. The play is mainly about social structure, the relationship between people in society and the separation between social classes. As Clark Waggoner explains, the play tries to shed light on the