Just as the playwrights of Absurdism rejected existing theatrical traditions, the poet e. e. cummings departed from the norms of traditional poetry with his unconventional use of grammar, syntax, and punctuation. His collection 100 Selected Poems, published in 1989 by Grove Press, contains such poems as “anyone lived in a pretty how town,” “next to of course god america i,” and “my sweet old etcetera.”

Some of the most famous images of artist René Magritte, like the green apple or the black bowler hat, are often described as absurdist. Robert Hughes’s The Portable Magritte, Universe Publishers (2001), provides an illustrated study of Magritte’s work.

Kurt Vonnegut’s Slaughterhouse Five, Dell Publishing (1969), draws on the author’s own experiences as a prisoner of war in the German city of Dresden during the World War II Allied firebombing that killed hundreds of thousands of German civilians. In many ways, the novel shares Absurdism’s sense of futility in the wake of mass destruction.

Many music videos employ the elements of Absurdism, and a number of books are available on music video as a popular art form. Among them are: Thirty Frames per Second: The Visionary Art of the Music Video by Steven Reiss, Neil Feineman, and Jeff Ayeroff, Harry N. Abrams, Inc. Publishers (2000); Rocking Around the Clock: Music Television, Postmodernism, and Consumer Culture by E. Ann Kaplan, Methuen Drama (1987); and Dancing in the Distraction Factory: Music Television and Popular Culture by Andrew Goodwin, University of Minnesota Press (1992).