الفهرس 
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Abstract
The problems of the study: The study’s main problem revolves around the development and structure of the dramatic conflicts in four dramas by two playwrights of different nationalities, cultures and backgrounds and how these dramatic conflicts follow the dialectic pattern in their progression on both levels of character development and dramatic structures of the plays in question. These playwrights are the Swiss German playwright Friedrich Dürrenmatt (1921-1990) and the contemporary British playwright John Arden (1930- ). The objectives of the study: • It is the present thesis’ aim to show some images of these conflicts through analyzing and tracing the development and structure of each one of them in the respective dramas. • The study runs another risk of establishing a pattern that proves a systematic progression for the conflicts in question. It has depended on a philosophical theory: “the dialectic logic / system” that will be established as the criterion for the comparative analysis. Division of study: The study is divided into an introduction, three consecutive chapters and a conclusion (the findings of the study). • The introduction unfolds the main topic of the thesis, its objective, its scope of study, and the method and procedures followed in the study. It further provides a brief overview of the crucial influences that both shape the two playwrights’ way of thinking and direct their interests towards certain issues that dominate their writings. • Chapter One provides a detailed account of the concept of dramatic conflict, its different types and its significance in the works of the two playwrights concerned as related both to their world views and dramaturgy. The theory of “dialectic logic” is introduced as a systematic criterion on which self-struggle is examined on both structural and thematic bases. • Chapter Two examines the struggles which the main characters in Dürrenmatt’s The Visit of the Old Lady (1956) and Arden’s Serjeant Musgrave’s Dance (1959) go through. It further explores the techniques each dramatist utilizes in representing the characters’ struggles. The chapter is named for the protagonists’ prospective aims; namely prosperity, justice and peace. • Chapter Three investigates other images of struggle that are represented in Dürrenmatt’s The Physicists (1962) and Arden’s The Happy Haven (1960). These struggles are rather for inner as well as external freedom, dignity, and power. The developments of the main characters in pursuing such aims are analyzed and dissected into phases for the sake of clarity and precision. Conclusion: The results of this study: The conclusion of the thesis is a wrap-up of the findings that have been reached at the end of the analysis of the dramas in question. These findings are as follows: 1- Both Dürrenmatt and Arden do similarly believe in the futility of all man’s actions to change his society. They effectively dramatize their characters’ conflicts as dialectical processes that embrace some disputing forces resulting in no tolerable solution.Therefore; they do not provide any confirmed answers or solutions for the problems represented in their works. 2- No one of the characters in the four dramas manages to achieve a sound goal or aim. Their gains are ultimately revealed to be ill-gotten, disgraceful, and faked ones. 3- The developments of all the examined characters through the action of the plays concerned correspond to the dialectical progression at the end of which nothing is really achieved. 4-Dürrenmatt’s method in structuring his plays is different from Arden’s. While Dürrenmatt adheres to the logical progression of the plot as based on the causal lines of necessity, Arden’s plays are episodically structured in a series of short scenes interspersed with songs and dance. In addition, the techniques each one of the playwrights uses are different. 5-The thesis suggests that, with the exception of John Arden’s Serjeant Musgrave on rather the level of dramatic structure, the ‘Dialectic Approach’ is a systematic pattern that can best represent the internal conflict (self-struggle) of the characters on the one hand and the form and dramatic structure of the whole play on the other hand.