[Handke] uses all the old-modern tricks. In one of his plays not a single word is spoken. In another, the characters are to be given the names of the actors who play them. These devices are intended to disorient the spectators, to deny them the familiar naturalistic illusions, the comforts of character and narrative. By now these distancing effects are as stale as any of the conventions of the well-made play and have built up their own expectations in the audience. The confections of their originators—Jarry, Brecht, Ionesco, Beckett—seem … stagey … and enjoyable…. [You] soon pick up the resonances of Ubu or Godot in They Are Dying Out or The Ride Across Lake Constance. But just because Handke derives his techniques from so many of the standard modern sources, it may be easier to isolate the individuality and consistency of his themes.

Handke is preoccupied with domination...