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WAITING FOR GODOT
BY SAMUEL BECKETT
Samuel Beckett Biography
SAMUEL BECKETT
(possibly April 13,
1906 - December
22, 1989)
 Although Beckett
insisted he was
born on Good
Friday, April 13
1906, his birth
certificate puts the
date a month later.
 An absurdist Irish
playwright,
novelist and poet.
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SAMUEL BECKETT
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studied French, Italian and
English at Trinity College, Dublin
from 1923 to 1927, and shortly
thereafter took a teaching post in
Paris.
There he met James Joyce, who
was to have a massive influence on
him.
Beckett continued his writing
career while doing some secretarial
duties for Joyce.
In 1929 he published his first work,
a critical essay defending Joyce's
work.
in 1930 he won a small literary
prize with his poem "Whoroscope,"
which largely concerns René
Descartes, another major influence.
SAMUEL BECKETT
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In 1930, he returned to Trinity College as a
lecturer, but left after less than two years, and
began to travel throughout Europe.
spent time in London, publishing his critical
study of Proust there in 1931, and in 1933, in
the wake of his father's death, he began two
years of Jungian psychotherapy with Dr.
Wilfred Bion, who in 1935 took him to hear
Jung's third Tavistock lecture, an event which
he would still recall many years later.
In 1932 he worked on his first novel, Dream of
Fair to Middling Women, but after many
rejections from publishers he decided instead to
split it into several smaller parts and re-titled it
More Pricks Than Kicks, and in 1933 it was
published in this form.
In 1935 he worked on his novel Murphy, which
still showed the heavy influence of Joyce, and
then in 1936 departed for extensive travels
around Germany, during which time he filled
several notebooks with lists of noteworthy
artwork that he had seen, and also noted his
distaste for the Nazi savagery which was then
taking over the country.
SAMUEL BECKET
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In 1937, he returned to Ireland
briefly, but after a falling-out
with his mother he decided to
settle permanently in Paris.
In December, when refusing
the solicitations of a pimp, he
was stabbed and nearly killed,
and while recovering he met
the woman who would be his
lifelong companion, Suzanne
Descheveaux-Dumesnil. (In
1961, in a secret civil ceremony
in England, he married her,
but mainly, as with Joyce, due
to reasons relating to French
inheritance law.)
In 1938 he published Murphy
and the next year translated it
into French.
SAMUEL BECKETT
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He remained in France at the outbreak of
World War II and following the 1940
occupation by Germany, Beckett joined
the French Resistance, working as a
courier.
During the next two years, on several
occasions he was almost caught by the
Gestapo but in August of 1942 his unit
was betrayed by a former Catholic priest
and he and Suzanne fled south on foot to
the safety of the small village of
Roussillon, in the Vaucluse département
on the Provence Alpes Cote d'Azur
region.
Although Samuel Beckett rarely spoke
about his war time activities, during the
two years he stayed in Roussillon, he
helped the Maquis sabotage the German
army in the Vaucluse mountains. While
in hiding, he began work on the novel
Watt which he would complete in 1945.
For his efforts in fighting the German
occupation, he was awarded the Croix de
Guerre and the Médaille de la Résistance
by the French government.
SAMUEL BECKETT
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Beckett is most famous for the play
Waiting for Godot (published 1952,
English translation published
1955), which opened to mainly bad
reviews but slowly became very
popular and is still often performed
today.
Like most of his works after 1947,
the play was first written in
French (under the title En
attendant Godot).
Beckett is thus considered one of
the great French "absurdist"
playwrights of the twentieth
century, along with Ionesco and
Jean Genet.
He translated his works into the
English language himself.
SAMUEL BECKETT
Beckett's theatre is
stark, fundamentally
minimalist, and
deeply pessimistic
about human nature
and the human
situation.
 Beckett was awarded
the Nobel Prize in
literature in 1969.
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Beckett died
December 22, 1989
OTHER WORKS BY SAMUEL BECKETT
Eleutheria (1940s, first published 1995)
Waiting for Godot (first published 1952)
Endgame (published 1957)
Happy Days (published 1960)
All That Fall (radio play, 1956)
Act Without Words I (1956)
Act Without Words II (1956)
Krapp's Last Tape (1958)
Rough for Theatre I (late 1950s)
Rough for Theatre II (late 1950s)
Embers (1959)
Rough for Radio I (radio play, never
broadcast, 1961, rewritten as Cascando)
Rough for Radio II (radio play, early 1960s)
Words and Music (radio play, 1961)
Cascando (radio play, 1962)
Play (1963)
Film (film, 1963)
The Old Tune (radio play, adaptation of
Robert Pinget's La Manivelle, published
1963)
Come and Go (1965)
Eh Joe (television play, 1965)
Breath (1969)
Not I (1972)
That Time (1975)
Footfalls (1975)
Ghost Trio (television play, 1975)
... but the clouds ... (television play, 1976)
A Piece of Monologue (1980)
Rockaby (1981)
Ohio Impromptu (1981)
Quad (1982)
Catastrophe (1982)
Nacht und Träume (television play, 1982)
What Where (1983)
ABOUT WAITING FOR GODOT
By Samuel Beckett
ABOUT WAITING FOR GODOT
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Waiting for Godot qualifies as
one of Samuel Beckett's most
famous works.
Originally written in French in
1948, Beckett personally
translated the play into English.
The world premiere was held on
January 5, 1953, in the Left
Bank Theater of Babylon in
Paris.
The play's reputation spread
slowly through word of mouth
and it soon became quite famous.
Other productions around the
world rapidly followed.
The play initially failed in the
United States, likely as a result
of being misfiled as "the laugh of
four continents." A subsequent
production in New York City was
more carefully advertised and
garnered some success.
ABOUT WAITING FOR GODOT
Waiting for Godot
incorporates many of
the themes and ideas
that Beckett had
previously discussed
in his other writings.
 The use of the play
format allowed
Beckett to dramatize
his ideas more
forcefully than before,
which is one of the
reasons that the play
is so intense.
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ABOUT WAITING FOR GODOT
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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 alleviate
their boredom.
Godot can be understood
as one of the many
things in life that people
wait for.
ABOUT WAITING FOR GODOT
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The play has often been
viewed as fundamentally
existentialist in its take on
life.
The fact that none of the
characters retain a clear
mental history means that
they are constantly
struggling to prove their
existence.
Thus the boy who
consistently fails to
remember either of the two
protagonists casts doubt
on their very existence.
This is why Vladimir
demands to know that the
boy will in fact remember
them the next day.
ABOUT WAITING FOR GODOT
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Waiting for Godot is part
of the Theater of the
Absurd. This implies that
it is meant to be irrational.
Absurd theater does away
with 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.
Thus Vladimir represents
the intellect and Estragon
the body, both of whom
cannot exist without the
other.
WAITING FOR GODOT
Characters
VLADIMIR AND ESTRAGON
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When Beckett started writing he did not have
a visual image of Vladimir and Estragon. They
are never referred to as tramps in the text.
[Beckett said]: The only thing I'm sure of is
that they're wearing bowlers.
There are no physical descriptions of either of
the two characters; however, the text indicates
that Vladimir is likely the heavier of the pair.
The bowlers and other broadly comic aspects of
their personas have reminded modern
audiences of Laurel and Hardy, who
occasionally played tramps in their films.
Vladimir stands through most of the play
whereas Estragon sits down numerous times
and even dozes off.
Estragon is preoccupied with mundane things,
what he can get to eat and how to ease his
physical aches and pains; he is direct, intuitive.
He finds it hard to remember but can recall
certain things when prompted
They have been together for fifty years but
when asked – by Pozzo – they don't reveal their
actual ages.
Vladimir's life is not without its discomforts too
but he is the more resilient of the pair.
Throughout the play the couple refer to each
other by pet names, "Didi" and "Gogo.”
POZZO AND LUCKY
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We learn very little about Pozzo besides the fact that
he is on his way to the fair to sell his slave, Lucky.
He presents himself very much as the Ascendancy
landlord, bullying and conceited.
He confesses to a poor memory but it is more a result
of an abiding self-absorption. "Pozzo is a character
who has to overcompensate. That's why he overdoes
things ... and his overcompensation has to do with a
deep insecurity in him."
Pozzo controls Lucky by means of an extremely long
rope which he jerks and tugs if Lucky is the least bit
slow.
Lucky is the absolutely subservient slave of Pozzo and
he unquestioningly does his every bidding with "doglike devotion".
Lucky speaks only once in the play and it is a result of
Pozzo's order to "think" for Estragon and Vladimir.
Pozzo and Lucky had been together for sixty years
and, in that time, their relationship has deteriorated.
Lucky has always been the intellectually superior but
now, with age, he has become an object of contempt:
his "think" is a caricature of intellectual thought and
his "dance" is a sorry sight.
Despite his horrid treatment at Pozzo's hand however,
Lucky remains completely faithful to him. Even in the
second act when Pozzo has inexplicably gone blind,
and needs to be led by Lucky rather than driving him
as he had done before, Lucky remains faithful and has
not tried to run away; they are clearly bound together
by more than a piece of rope.
THE BOYS
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The boy in Act I, a local lad, assures
Vladimir that this is the first time
he has seen him. He says he was
not there the previous day. He
confirms he works for Mr. Godot as
a goatherd. His brother, whom
Godot beats, is a shepherd. Godot
feeds both of them and allows them
to sleep in his hayloft.
The boy in Act II also assures
Vladimir that it was not he who
called upon them the day before. He
insists that this too is his first visit.
When Vladimir asks what Godot
does the boy tells him, "He does
nothing, sir." We also learn he has a
white beard – possibly, the boy is
not certain. This boy also has a
brother who it seems is sick but
there is no clear evidence to suggest
that his brother is the boy that
came in Act I or the one who came
the day before that.
GODOT
The
identity of
Godot has
been the
subject of
much debate.
WAITING FOR GODOT
Setting
SETTING
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There is only one scene
throughout both acts.
Two men are waiting on a
country road by a tree.
The script calls for Estragon to
sit on a low mound but in
practice – as in Beckett's own
1975 German production – this
is usually a stone.
In the first act the tree is bare.
In the second, a few leaves have
appeared despite the script
specifying that it is the next
day.
The minimal description calls to
mind "the idea of the lieu
vague, a location which should
not be particularised."