Theme of Waiting and Human Condition in Samuel Beckett's "Waiting for Godot"

Theatre is a complex art that attempts to weave stories of varying degrees of intricacies with the hope that feelings will be elicited from the audience. Samuel Beckett’s most famous work in the theatre world, however, is Waiting for Godot, the play in which, according to well-known Irish critic Vivian Mercier, “nothing happens, twice.” Beckett pioneered many different levels of groundbreaking and avant-garde theatre and had a large influence on the section of the modern idea of presentational theatre as opposed to the representational. His career seemingly marks the end of modernism in theatre and the creation of what is known as the “Theatre of the Absurd.”

Hamlet is a suspenseful play that introduces the topic of tragedy. Throughout the play, Hamlet displays anger, uncertainty, and obsession with death. Although Hamlet is unaware of it, these emotions cause the mishaps that occur throughout the play. These emotions combined with his unawareness are the leading basis for the tragic hero’s flaws. These flaws lead Hamlet not to be a bad man, but a regular form of imperfection that comes along with being human.

Hamlet, the eponymous hero of Shakespeare’s greatest work, descends swiftly into madness and paranoia after the murder of his father and the realization of his mother’s true, morally reprehensible, nature. As a result of these new responsibilities and extreme circumstances, Hamlet diverges from his usual, logical thinking into paranoia and over analysis, a condition that prevents him from trusting anyone. Hamlet, having been born a prince, is, for the first time, forced to make his own decisions after he learns of the true means of his father’s death. Another contributing factor to his madness is the constant probing of others into Hamlet’s sanity. These factors all contribute to Hamlets delay, and that delay contributes to the tragic

Whether you drowned in the text in your final year of school, or saw it in that one ‘Simpsons’ episode in 2009, everyone at least, kind of knows the story of that curse’d Scottish Play. Yet, what you might not know is that the hardest part to nail about the play isn’t the language, but instead, the complex themes that run through the story. Throughout this tragic tale, countless characters succumb to the pressures of maintaining their macho-man status, while others use their new-found ‘manliness’ to accomplish unbelievable things. Masculine ambition is a theme that underpins the entire plot and is the unfortunate downfall of many great (and not so great) characters.

Before the loss of a loved one, a person may bargain with God saying that they will do anything if only their loved one’s life would be spared. After the loss, the hope is that life will go back to what it was before, and may include more bargaining with God (Kessler, 2012). Bargaining is seen through Job when he is visited by his friends who point out to him that he is being judged by God. He begs his friends to tell him what he is doing wrong and then bargains with God, pleading with Him to tell him what he is doing wrong (Lyon, 2000).

In William Shakespeare’s play, Hamlet, much of the underlying reasoning and causes for subsequent actions are seen in Act II. The plot begins to thicken and the reader starts to anticipate or even assume what will happen next. It is in this act that Hamlet’s central image starts to develop and even shift his external conflict to more of an internal one. As a result, his relationships with people become more strained and end up playing as an element in his act of madness.

The Presence of a Provident God As Marissa Meyer says, “Maybe there isn’t such a thing as fate. Maybe it’s just the opportunities we’re given, and what we do with them”. This argument of fate versus free will persists in Tom Stoppard’s play, Rosencrantz and Guildenstern Are Dead. Specifically, the titular characters contemplate the role of fate and free will within their lives.

Godot is vengeful, yet is also a savior to them. If they leave, they will be punished. Stay, and they are rewarded. Sounds an awful lot like the Judeo-Christian-Islam God. Godot represent a relief from this empty and boring stage, which perhaps represents life. We are all waiting for something, it's how we fill in the time until whatever is going to happen happens that is the subject of the play. Life has no meaning - this play has no meaning.

Modernist fiction is incredibly dense and abstract. Writers from the twentieth century also seem to carry with them the weight of the world, and thus their fiction has been filled with realistic misery and pain. Still, these writers often add to this element with existentialist thematic structures, which construct a very unique and experimental viewpoint on a modern existence. This is what is occurring in both Samuel Beckett's Waiting for Godot as well as Albert Camus' The Stranger. The two a very different in format, yet both play upon the modernist idea of abandonment by God and the idea that there is an underlying sense of nothingness that guides modern life. Each focuses on the notion of free will and how it determines our lives in a world devoid of God. Together, these great works of contemporary fiction are a telling testament to the changing nature of sentiments regarding both religion and the meaning of life in a tumultuous twentieth century paradigm.

At least six or seven years pass after the writing of Midsummer Night’s Dream before we find Shakespeare engaged on Hamlet, the second of the great plays with an important Supernatural element, and, in the opinion of many, the greatest tragedy ever penned. What a profound change has come over his attitude towards the Unseen! No longer does he handle it in . . . [a] cheerful,

Who is Godot and what does he represent? These are two of the questions that Samuel Beckett allows both his characters and the audience to ponder. Many experiences in this stage production expand and narrow how these questions are viewed. The process of waiting reassures the characters in Beckett's play that they do indeed exist. One of the roles that Beckett has assigned to Godot is to be a savior of sorts. Godot helps to give the two tramps in Waiting for Godot a sense of purpose. Godot is an omnipresent character that helps to give meaning and function to the lives of two homeless men.

The periods of silence in Waiting for Godot are moments in which the characters realize where there is no certainty, there can be no definite meanings and words are just futile nonsense. No matter how much they use language, how long they talk to each other or what they talk about, silence will eventually fall on them like a haunting cloud, reminding them that they are no more than two tramps who are waiting for someone to redeem them.

1. How does the relationship between Vladimir and Estragon compare with the relationship between Pozzo and Lucky? What is the effect created by the contrast between these two pairs of characters? Is it significant that the characters appear in pairs, rather than alone?

The play Waiting for Godot by Samuel Beckett is famous for its cyclic storyline and non-existing plot. In the lines, Beckett incorporates themes of existentialism and the loss of hope. Throughout the two acts of the play, the main protagonists, Vladimir and Estragon, spend their days waiting aimlessly for a mysterious figure named Godot. While central in the play, Godot never makes an appearance in any act, and merely exists as a name. While Pozzo and Lucky, two other characters make their appearance in each act of the play, the boy is perhaps the most mysterious and intriguing. The boy, whom appears towards the end of each act, exemplifies the never-ending cycle of the search for hope that remains unfulfilled through the use of symbolism,

In Waiting for Godot, Beckett often focused on the idea of "the suffering of being." Most of the play deals with the fact that Estragon and Vladimir are waiting for something to relieve them from their boredom. Godot can be understood as one of the many things in life that people wait for. Waiting for Godot is part of the ‘Theater of the Absurd’. This implies that it is meant to be irrational and meaningless. Absurd theater does not have the concepts of drama, chronological plot, logical language, themes, and recognizable settings. There is also a split between the intellect and the body within the work. Vladimir represents the intellect and Estragon the body, both cannot exist without the other.