Theatre of the Absurd: Samuel Beckett's 'Waiting for Godot'.

Theatre of the Absurd : Samuel Beckett 's `Waiting for Godot

Of all absurd plays , Samuel Beckett 's play is the most absurd . While reading it , one does not know what reality is . The notion of time loses its sense , the memory is short and the only thing one can be sure of is that one is still living and breathing . And even such things can be doubted . Rene Descartes asserted that the process of thinking means existence and one could not be sure of all other things . However , the process of thinking in

`Waiting for Godot ' is rather absurd . Absurdity is not the only thing about this play . The more you read it , the more symbols and allusions you find . Some words , simple and meaningless point to some direction to which our thoughts wonder guided with a little assistance from the author . One definite direction is the Holy Bible , which is approached without any awe , half-mocking half-worshipping . The figure of Christ is looming behind some remarks In some places , the main characters are even compared to Christ not by means of metaphor and symbolism but by direct remarks of the characters However , the Bible is not the only source of allusions . Some prominent literary works and poems are being alluded too . Samuel Beckett is often considered to be the greatest dramatist of the 20th century . The language of this play is well worth attention . As the play was originally written in French , the text of the play is a translation made by the author himself . And that was changing wit different editions and staging . Samuel Beckett listened to the advice from the experienced theatrical producers and cut and changed some text in his play . Anyway the text we are going to analyze has come through all those evolutions and now it is what it is - a masterpiece of the theatre of absurd with lots of thoughts and ideas in it

Three things at least are important to the consideration of `Waiting for Godot : its association with the traditions of the clown and with vaudeville , the question of Godot and his meaning , and the strategies of waiting . As for the first , we need to see it as an existentialist comedy , a genre not ordinarily associated with the philosophies of Sartre , but in this case indispensably linked . It is a comedy in its many devices , taken from the reductive and derisive antics of the circus down , and the vaudeville and the Burlesque stage . It owes much to pantomime as well , of which Beckett has elsewhere proved himself a master . John R . Moore , in a vase essay on Godot , has suggested that we may consider "Gogo and Didi as very distant (perhaps the last descendants of Don Quixote and Sancho Panza " The parallel is justly indicated , but also shrewdly qualified . Estragon and Vladimir are very remote indeed , from Don Quixote and Sancho Panza they are not so much misguided idealist and comic realist , but both existential naturalists Like the clown or comic , they...