Waiting for Godot

Waiting for Godot , by Samuel Beckett. New York: Grove Press, 1954.

Waiting for anyone is a usual problem these days, particularly in America. It is, for one example, the army's, "Hurry up and wait." Or when will you be through with the bathroom. Or when—anything.

But to deal with this, as one says, in a play is not at all simple. Granted the obvious difficulty of having nothing happen, in fact of having nothing happen what happens—how not to release the audience just by that, i.e., how far can one go with this? A friend tells me of a problem she had been given as a dancer, wherein she was to effect movements which would, in turn, effect an intolerable boredom. First the audience would shift a bit, then writhe more openly, until, at last, something would snap. And that would be the point.

It's point enough, frankly. As it is, we live on the edge of it all too often, and one can say that Beckett is aware of this—of a deep, deep pointlessness, which maims people far more than they are willing to acknowledge. Certainly far more than they are able to repair. His play, then, is an abstraction of this awareness. Two men, indiscriminate, waiting for a third, who will prove something not only for them, but equally of them. It will effect something. Otherwise they have been there for they are by no means sure how long. Other things happen—activity of a kind—but what does this mean?

There are three other 'characters' in the play (Lucky, a liberal slave; Pozzo, the landowner who 'owns' him; and A Boy, the absent Godot's perpetual messenger), but they are frosting of a kind. And literally enough, the play is that which I have just quoted. Some parts are better than other parts but they are all the same thing. It is a play of 'the same thing,' taken as far as Beckett has thought practicable.

It's here, in this question of practicability, that one can, I think, argue at least the obvious difficulties. One is, for example, how effect variations upon this monotony , which will appear to relieve it, but which will, in fact, only contribute to it. It is the particular tight-rope on which the play must balance. To let this monotony slack—that's no good; but without some relief, the man watching (remembering that he has both chosen and paid to watch) shudders and leaves. So Beckett chooses to make it a 'ballet' of sorts, by which I mean, a very formal and mannered interplay.

But it stays a spectacle —and that in itself is too much a relief from it. I think Beckett has, finally, solved the dilemma elsewhere, i.e., in a story called "The End" (printed in Merlin , Vol. II, No. 3). The hero of this is an old man from anywhere one cares to think of, for himself. Let out of a hospital, sanatorium, or whatever, he begins to

stagger. "I am greatly obliged to you for these clothes, I said, and for this money, is there a law which prevents you from throwing me out naked and penniless?" He turns to begging.

There are those to be sure, who stoop, but generally speaking, people who give alms much prefer to do so without having to stoop. What they prefer above all is to espy the wretch from afar, get ready their penny, drop it in their stride, with an innocent air, and hear the God bless you dying in the distance. Personally, I never said that, nor anything like it, but I did make a noise with my mouth. So I got a kind of board, and tied it to my neck and waist. It jutted out just at the right height, pocket height, and its edge was far enough from my person for the mite to be bestowed without fear of contagion.

One day I was present at a strange scene. Normally I did not see much. I did not hear much either. But on this particular day the intrusion was too marked. For some time I had thought I heard an unwonted sound. I did not investigate the cause. For I said to myself, It's going to stop. But as it did not stop I had no choice but to find out the cause, and so be rid of it. Its cause was a man perched on the roof of a car, haranguing the passers-by, of whom many stopped, the better to see and hear. That at least was the way I looked at it. He was bellowing so loud that snatches of his oration reached my ears: injustice . . . union . . . brothers . . . Marx . . . capital . . . bread . . . love . . . right to live. It was all Greek to me. The car was drawn up against the curb, just in front of me, and I saw the orator, from behind. All of a sudden he turned around towards me, as to a specimen. Look at this down and out, he vociferated, this leftover. If he doesn't go down on four paws, it's for fear of being impounded. Old, lousy, rotten, in the garbage heap. And there are a thousand like him, worse than him, ten thousand, twenty thousand. A voice. Thirty thousand. In your plutocratic Sodom, resumed the orator, every day of your life you pass them by, and when you have won at the races you fling them a farthing. Do you ever think? The voice, No. No, indeed, resumed the orator, you find that normal, the way of the world. A penny, tuppence. The voice. Thruppence. It never enters your head, resumed the orator, that your charity is a crime, that you are subscribing to enslavement, stultification and organized murder. Take a good look at this living corpse. You may tell me it's his own fault. The voice, After you. Then he bent down towards me and flung me a phrase I did not understand. I had perfected my board. It now consisted of two boards hinged together, which enabled me, when my work was done, to fold it and carry it under my arm. So I took off the rag, as I always did when my work was done, pocketed the few coins remaining on the board, untied the board, folded it and put it under my arm. Do you hear me, you crucified bastard! the orator cried. Then I went away, although it was still light . . .