“Waiting
for Godot,” by the absurdist Samuel Beckett, is my favorite play.
Exactly why this is may favorite is difficult to explain as the the play
itself is difficult to explain; however, the explanation can be as
simple as the play is simple. One must experience Beckett’s work here to
fully appreciate this perspective. The play is absurd and it is simple.
The play makes no sense, yet plunges deep with its themes into meaning,
an agenda is clear.
Beckett’s
main character is an “invisible center” as in both acts (there are only
two) two men pass the time in waiting for him. The main character never
appears, is never heard and nearly nothing is known about him--even by
Valadamir (Didi) and Estragon (Gogo) who wait for him for reasons
unknown. Yet, they must wait. Other characters appear with their time on
the stage: Pozzo with loyal Lucky (who, incidentally, delivers a
fine-hatted speech) and a boy.
Didi
and Gogo are children at heart. They do what they are told, without
question. They are told to wait and so they do. While they wait they ask
questions in and of themselves and the moment they seem to reach a
point of understanding, all meaning suddenly gives way and collapses
into despair. They return to their starting point: waiting.
One
reason why this play is so appealing to me is how it reminds me of my
childhood. One scene comes to mind: I am five years old and riding in
the back of the car. Since seat belts were not an issue in those days of
thost steel-bodied road-boats we called “cars”, I was probably riding
up in the rear window of the car, laying in the space up above the back
seats. My father was driving and talking with mother. I don’t recall
what they talked about, but I never questioned my father. One never
questioned. One simply did as he was told. If I gave the slightest hint I
did in fact follow the conversation between them, it quickly fractured
into spelled words and meaning slipped my mental grasp. I was shut out
and left to my own questions.
Never question. Just do as you are told. Wait for Godot, no matter how long it takes--even if he never comes. So what, exactly, is a child to do?
Didi
and Gogo show the disaster of not asking questions, of asking the right
questions to the wrong person, or asking the wrong questions altogether
with no direction, correction or instruction. Left to their own
devices, they stand at the threshold of despair. The heart is
deceitfully wicked--who can know it? They explore reality and come very
near shaping one of their own understanding and have no discernment to
see reality as it should be. The boy at the end of both scenes may be
their only key to the real world, showing them that things are not what
they seem.
The
most intriguing portion of the play occurs early in the first act where
Didi asks Gogo concerning the Gospel. Everyone’s heard it and behind it
all, there is the question of paradise, reality. While they wait and
discuss the heavenly realm, they wrestle with what is real: pain,
hunger, cold, harsh landscape, life and death. These lead to questions,
less “why” but “for what purpose.” Beckett takes us very close to the
spiritual realm and there must be a way to make sense of it and to do
so, one must ask questions. The best one to ask is the Architect of
paradise. Even a child knows this.
