The play opens with two tramps, Estragon and Vladimir, by
a roadside. We don’t know who or where they are; they talk throughout the play, but
nothing happens. There is, in fact, no purpose or reason for their existence; they are
in an absurd universe. We look for meaning in the circumstances in which we find
ourselves, but there is no meaning to be found. Waiting for Godot
is repetitive; the two characters cycle through certain exchanges. They have
quarrels, and they become affectionate at places. We may even suspect that there is
something sexual between them, but we don’t know because that would represent something
happening. As it transpires, the two tramps are doing something—they’re waiting for a
mysterious person or entity called Godot. Is this God? Toward the end of the play, a boy
tells the characters that Godot isn’t coming today; they will have to keep waiting.
Estragon asks Vladimir if they should leave, and Vladimir replies, “Yes, let’s go.” And
yet the final stage direction is: They do not move. On one level,
Beckett’s play is a witty game with the propositions of existentialism, a philosophical
school that held that meaning in life is created by action, not essence. If one does
nothing, existentialism proposes, then life is meaningless, absurd. Further, if God does
not exist, then the universe is meaningless. Literature must make itself out of that
cosmic emptiness. It must extract the meaning of meaningless-ness. Beckett creates a
world in which there is no heroism, no society, no superhuman agency—none of the
furniture with which we are familiar in literature. We are all stateless tramps, on a
road to nowhere. It’s impossible to exaggerate the impact that Waiting for
Godot had on English theater and culture in the
mid-1950s.
Friday, March 13, 2015
What does this 'Waiting for Godot' represent? is it a punishment, can it be Estragon & Vladimir's act of waiting just as "The myth of sisiphys".
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