Key Elements in Samuel Beckett’s “Waiting for Godot”

“Waiting for Godot” is an Absurdist Play penned by Samuel Beckett, first in French, and later in English.

SETTING

Beckett’s own script notes can best describe the setting of “Waiting for Godot”: “A country road. A tree“. There is an otherworldly alienation in this sparse setting. It could be anywhere, in any country of the world. No visible horizon exists; no markers of civilization are present. The setting is constant; the only change occurs between Act I and Act II when the barren tree of Act I gives birth to five or six leaves in Act II.

The historical setting is unspecified. The time frame is most likely two days, one of which is probably a Saturday. The only visible reference to the passage of time occurs at the end of Act II when the sun sets and the moon rises. There are verbal references to the passing of time, such as when the characters make mention of yesterday and the previous evening.

LIST OF CHARACTERS

Major Characters

Estragon (Gogo)

A tramp with a sore foot. He wears boots and a bowler hat. He is obsessed with his needs, his health, and his hunger.

Vladimir (Didi)

Estragon’s companion. He is a philosopher, overly concerned with the state of his life. When Estragon appears consumed by physical suffering, Vladimir is preoccupied with metaphysical suffering – the cruelty of life, the injustices of the world. Like Estragon, he wears slightly oversized boots and a bowler hat.

Pozzo

An extravagant traveler and harsh slave master whose arrogance and pride annoys the two tramps. Later in the play, he suddenly becomes blind.

Lucky

Pozzo’s unfortunate servant. He has led around on a rope. In the second act, he becomes mute.

A Messenger Boy

He is sent by Godot to tell the tramps he will not arrive today. The messenger boy periodically reveals bits of information about the mysterious Godot.

Godot

An unseen person for whom Vladimir and Estragon are waiting. All that is known about Godot is that he has goatherds and shepherds and a long white beard. He does nothing all day and has asked the tramps to meet him by the tree on Saturday. He never appears.

CONFLICT

Protagonist

Vladimir is a somewhat philosophical tramp, spending a lot of time thinking about the state of his life in general. He is usually committed to waiting for Godot, and constantly reminds Estragon that they must wait rather than kill themselves or move on. He likes to talk about the past, and has vague recollections about Bible stories which he periodically shares; he enjoys good conversation and becomes frustrated with Estragon when he does not keep up with him. At times, he displays some pride, such as when he does not want Estragon to beg a bone from Pozzo. Estragon looks to him for intellectual guidance. Together, the two tramps become the central focus of the play; despite their absurd bantering and burlesque appearance, they seem at the mercy of the universe, and as such are almost sympathetic characters who just want a better life.

At the most superficial level, the two tramps can be called the protagonists in the play. However, they represent the whole of mankind. They correlate the actions of the other characters to the general concerns of mankind. Even though it is not definite, there are implications that Vladimir knows more about Godot and is the one to remind Estragon of their destiny-that is, that they must wait for Godot.

Antagonist

Pozzo is a wealthy man, commanding attention. He treats his servant, Lucky, with contempt and heaps abuses on him. Pozzo represents the adverse, absurd circumstances of life. He also represents the master, the controlling being. He is thus a sort of antagonist in the play. At times, God or fate, or whatever master of the universe exists, might also be an antagonist, bearing down on the two tramps and making their lives unbearable.

Climax

There is no real climax in the play. Act I happens, followed by a parallel and nearly identical Act II. Life goes on for the two characters, and there is no indication that the third day will be any different than the first two. The absurdist point is that nothing really changes. The circular structure of the play lends itself well to this eternal stasis.

Outcome

The outcome of the play is yet to be determined. There is every indication that had Beckett chosen to write Act III, it would have been very similar to Acts I and II. This unusual structure is an integral part of Beckett’s theme.

SHORT PLOT SUMMARY (Synopsis)

Two tramps named Estragon and Vladimir meet on the road, beside a tree. They are very happy to see each other, having been separated for an unspecified amount of time. Estragon has a sore foot and is having trouble taking his boot off. He tells Vladimir that he was beaten the previous evening.

The two men remember that they are supposed to wait under a tree on a Saturday for a man named Godot. It appears they do not remember the man named Godot very well, but they think he was going to give them an answer. They cannot remember the question. While they are waiting, Estragon falls asleep. Vladimir, suddenly feeling lonely, wakes Estragon. Tired of doing nothing, they begin talking about the tree and the wait, then settle on discussing their sorry condition. They are homeless and penniless, traveling from one place to another. They contemplate suicide by hanging. They nibble carrots and turnips for food. Most of the time, they simply wait for Godot.

After a while, Pozzo and Lucky join them. Lucky carries a heavy bag and is led by his master, Pozzo, with a rope. Pozzo sits on a stool, relaxes a little, and enjoys some chicken and wine. He is abusive to his servant by demanding things and being rude. Eventually, Lucky dozes off to sleep but is awakened by jerks on the rope from his master.

A hungry Estragon is eager to gnaw the chicken bones thrown on the ground by Pozzo. Pozzo explains that he has long desired that his slave would go away, but he never does. The master tells the tramps that Lucky is pitiful and old, and he would like to get rid of him soon. On hearing all this, Lucky cries. Estragon tries to comfort him but is rewarded by a hard kick in the leg from Lucky. At this point, Pozzo instructs his slave to dance and think and otherwise amuse the tramps. Lucky’s entertainment consists of dancing, which is more like an awkward shuffling motion, and thinking, which is a long and jumbled exercise in rambling. To shut him up, Vladimir takes away his hat. Eventually, the master and slave leave the tramps, and they continue their wait for Godot.

A little later, a young bog brings in a message that Godot might see them the next day, at the same hour and the same place. Meanwhile, night falls and the tramps decide to leave and come back the next day. Instead, they remain. The act ends.

The next act begins in the same fashion: the two tramps meet on the road after a separation. Nothing has changed except that the bare tree has sprouted five or six leaves. Vladimir is singing a song about a dog that has been beaten. Estragon reveals that he has been beaten as well, again. They resume their wait, though Estragon seems to have forgotten the events of the day before. Vladimir tries to remind him of his wounded leg and the unruly slave who kicked him. Estragon’s only memory is a vague one about the bone he was given to chew.

Bored with waiting, Vladimir spots Lucky’s hat, and the tramps begin playing with it. For some time, they initiate Pozzo and his slave. Still bored, they discuss suicide again, call each other names, and wait for Godot. After some time, Pozzo and Lucky re- appear. This time, however, Pozzo is blind and being led by Lucky. They are still bound by a rope, though this one is even shorter. Pozzo falls to the ground and cannot get up. In the process of helping him, Estragon and Vladimir also fall to the ground. The scene deteriorates into a burlesque, with characters trying to get up but only managing to become even more entangled. Finally, they can get up. Pozzo claims never to have met them before and shocks them by claiming that Lucky is mute. He becomes insulted and departs, stumbling away with Lucky.

The sunsets and the moon rises. A messenger boy enters, claiming not to be the same boy as from the day before. His message, however, is the same. Godot will not come today but will try to come tomorrow. He leaves and the two men again contemplate suicide. This time, they actually attempt it, but the suspender cords they try to use break up and Estragon ends up with his pants around his ankles. They decide to come back the next day with a rope, and if Godot does not arrive, they will hang themselves. They decide to move on, but as in the previous act, they stay where they are and the act ends.

MOOD

The play opens on a totally surreal note, with a tramp trying to pull off his boot on a lonely road under a leafless tree. There is no horizon, no sign of civilization. For a moment, this scene might even be considered comic. Eventually, however, the action unfolds and a mood of despair and futility settles over the stage. The surreal feeling never changes, it is merely added to by a host of other feelings. Characters are beaten, cursed, wounded-all without any sign of relief. The few moments of comedy are dampened by an overwhelming sense of tragedy and gloom. In the end, the eternal hopelessness of life permeates every aspect of both acts of the play.

BACKGROUND INFORMATION – BIOGRAPHY

SAMUEL BECKETT

Samuel Barclay Beckett was born on April 12, 1906 (Good Friday), in Foxrock, Ireland. He was the second son of his parents, Mary and William Beckett. At the age of five, he began attending kindergarten. A year later, he began studying languages and learned to play the piano. As a youth, he participated in many sports and also began writing. In 1920, he began publishing stories in a school newspaper. Eventually, he attended Trinity College in Dublin, studying literature.

After securing his B.A. degree in 1927, he took up a two-year fellowship at L’Ecole Normale Superieure in Paris. He befriended the writer James Joyce there. His fiction and criticism were published in Transition. In 1930, he won his first prize in a poetry contest. That same year he translated the “Anna Livia Phirabelle” section of Joyce’s Work in Progress into French with Alfred Peron. The next year, with George Pearson, he wrote Le, kid. It was a parody based on Corneille’s Cid. He was attacked by the Trinity College newspaper for this piece of work. During this time, he was working as an Assistant in French at Trinity College. In December 1931, he took his M.A. degree, and a month later resigned from the college. After returning to Paris from Germany in March 1932, he began writing on Dream of Fair to Middling Women. Simultaneously, he translated surrealist poems into English. He returned to Foxrock and a few months later his father died. His brother assumed control of his father’s firm.

In 1934, he published More Pricks Than Kicks, a work that was later banned. He also began working on Murphy. Four years later, he traveled to Paris and renewed his friendship with his long-time friend Joyce. He wrote his first poems in French. He somehow never appreciated the Nazi oppression of Jewish intellectuals. During the Second World War, he joined the resistance network. He fled to the free areas of France and survived mainly by doing agricultural work. He wrote Watt during this period. After a visit to Ireland in 1945, it became difficult for him to return to France.

He joined The Red Cross to help war-affected people and worked as an interpreter and storekeeper in a field hospital. Eventually, he made it back to France and lived through what many call his most creative period, in which he wrote such works as Waiting for Godot and Endgame. He was awarded the Nobel Prize for Literature in 1970.

HISTORICAL / SOCIAL BACKGROUND

Waiting for Godot premiered in 1953 at the Theatre de Babylone in Paris. The early twentieth century had been overshadowed by two World Wars that brought about uncertainties, despair, and new challenges to all of mankind. The poignancy and calamities of the wars found sharp reflections in the writings of the day. The global conflict and the nuclear destruction stamped a lasting impact on the minds of the writers. A pessimistic outlook laced with sadism and tangible violence, as a rich dividend of the aftermath of wars, provided both contour and content to the writings. The search for meaning had begun. With the future still hazy, writers began to search and research the new meaning of existence in a drastically changed world. A spirit of restlessness with a mixture of sardonic bitterness became an inherent feature of the writings. The writers were torn between a wrecked past and an unpredictable future. Their experiences and memories were neither lively and worth recollecting nor peaceful and worth treasuring. Hence, the mental conflict, distress, loneliness, and anxiety that they went through found an overt and dominant expression in their writings.

LITERARY BACKGROUND

Waiting for Godot was a unique outburst on the literary world. It did not claim to have a place in conventional drama; rather, it carried a “fascination” of its own, authenticated by the undercurrent of resentment in accepting the illogical and unreasonable norms of the society.

It was first written in French and called En attendant Godot. The author himself translated the play into English in 1954. The uniqueness of the play compelled the audiences to flock to the theaters for spectacularly continuous four hundred performances. At the time, there were two distinct opinions about the play; some called it a hoax and others called it a masterpiece. Nevertheless, Waiting for Godot has claimed its place in literary history as a masterpiece that changed the face of twentieth-century drama.

LITERATURE OF THE ABSURD

Literature of the Absurd is a term most often used to class together works by such artists as Samuel Beckett, Eugene Ionesco, Jean Genet, Edward Albee, and Harold Pinter. The reason these men formed this rather notoriously elite group of playwrights is rather obvious when one studies each playwright’s style and subject. Though none necessarily imitate each other, all share the same subjugation of plot, character, and theme. That is, there is no particular attention spent developing a recognizable plot, no detailed characterization, and no readily definable theme. This bizarre rejection of any recognizable pattern or development gave birth to the term Literature of the Absurd.

Literature of the Absurd followed closely on the heels of two of the twentieth century’s most recognizable literary styles: modernism and post-modernism. Modernism was a term widely used to signify the post World War I writings that questioned the traditional modes of religion, morality, and also traditional ways of conceiving one’s own existence. A prominent feature of modernism was its avant-garde contributors. A small group of writers and artists created a new form of style and expression and concentrated on hitherto neglected or forbidden matters. They were seen as free-spirited and unconventional, shocking and on the edge. Simultaneously, another artistic movement called surrealism was launched in France. Surrealism was a revolt against restrains, promoting free creativity violating norms and control over artistic expression and process. It was a revolutionary movement in all arts including literature. Post-modernism belonged to the post-World War II phase. The implacable unrest due to destruction, totalitarianism, and devastation in the name of progress became apparent in literature that became more and more separated from conventional art.

Literature of the Absurd was simply a later development of these innovative writing styles. It focused sharply on the irrationality and absurdity of the world. The writers exhibited an unreserved contempt and scorn for hypocrisy in the world. It was an intellectual reproduction of reality, rather than a physical or even practical one. The psychology of the work mirrored the helplessness and emptiness of human life as its creators saw it.

Samuel Beckett, the eminent and influential writer of this mode, wrote enormously in French and later translated his works into English. His plays depict the irrationalism of life in a grotesquely comic and non-consequential fashion with the element of “metaphysical alienation and tragic anguish.”

Read about Modernism in English Literature here.