Waiting for Godot: An Absurd Drama by Samuel Beckett

How absurd is meaningful? 

It’s all about waiting. The waiting is the only talked-about activity. The waiting is endless! The waiting is crucial! The waiting is commitment! There is no alternative but to wait.

So here, in ‘Waiting for Godot’ waiting is an action.

Let us contemplate on a few verses from Geeta. Geeta is the only religious book which is purely philosophical in nature.

"What is action? What is inaction? Even the wise are confused in this matter. This action, I shall explain to you, having known which, you shall be released from evil” (4:16)."

"The real nature of action is hard to understand” (4:17)."

“One who sees inaction in action, and action in inaction, is intelligent among men, and he is in the transcendental position, although engaged in all sorts of activities.”(4:18)."

Science says every action has a reaction, but those actions that do not reproduce reactions are inaction. But there is one condition. The action is performed in a transcendental position.

Now, philosophically transcendental means “asserting a fundamental irrationality or supernatural element in experience.”

Waiting is a fundamental irrational experience not only for the characters on stage, but also for the audience. This is also evident in repetition of the same dialogue between two characters at the end of Act 1 and Act II, in reverse order.

At the end of Act 1 in "Waiting for Godot".

"Estragon says: Well, shall we go?

Vladimir replies: Yes, Let’s go.

[They do not move.]

While in the end of Act 2

Vladimir says: Well, shall we go?

Estragon replies: Yes, Let’s go.

[They do not move.]"

Both of them said“Let’s Go”, but did not move. To say is an action which does not cause any reaction. In transcendence action is inaction and inaction becomes action.

Many dimensions of waiting have been explored and many yet remain to be explored. 

The waiting is in reference to time.

"Vladimir: That passed the time.

Estrogen: It would have passed anyway."

French Philosopher Henry Bergson in his theory of duration(la duree) established that time can be grasped through intuition and imagination only since its is permanently in the state of  ‘movable and incomplete’.

"Estragon: Simply wait.

Vladimir: We are used to it.

Waiting is habit. It is a conditioning of mind. It is Comfort zone. It is an identity fixation since ‘billions are doing it everyday."

Waiting is passion, and whole human life is passion. Man starts his journey with ‘doubt’:

"Estragon: You gave me a fright.

Vladimir: I thought it was he.

Estragon: Who?

Vladimir: Godot.

Estragon: Pah! The wind in the reeds.

Vladimir: I could have sworn I heard shouts.

Estrogen: And why would he shout?

Vladimir: At his horse."

Through doubt man wants to reach a 'belief '. The faith is a miracle. Waiting is for that miracle to happen. There are some pseudo-references in all religion that miracle do occur.

"Estragon: I remember the map of Holy Land. Coloured they were. Very pretty. The dead sea was pale blue. The very look of it made me thirsty. That’s where we will go, I used to say, that’s where we’ll go for our honeymoon. We will swim. We’ll be happy."

Waiting is hope that everything will be better tomorrow. 

Waiting is for 'Second Coming’, that would solve all their problems, waiting is for salvation and that is why they repent. The repeated references from the Old Testament and the New Testament reminds us of Christian Existentialist, Soren Kierkegaard. 

Does man suffer despair for want of faith in God.

Waiting is an escapism from the struggles and the nothingness of life.

Waiting is a journey from essentialism to existentialism.

Meaningful phrases from the play and lessons they teach:

1. Vladimir: Be reasonable, you haven't yet tried everything. And I resumed the struggle.

2. Vladimir: (He buttons his fly)Never neglect the little things of life.

3. Vladimir: Hope deferred maketh the something sick.

4. Vladimir: Blaming on his boots the fault of his feet.

5. Vladimir: The essential doesn't change.

6. Pozzo: Think twice before you do anything rash.

7. Pozzo: From the meanest creature one departs wiser, richer, more conscious of one's blessings.

8. Pozzo: I might just as well have been in his shoes and he in mine.

9. Vladimir: To every man his little cross.

10. Vladimir: Let us not waste our time in idle discourse.

T.S.Eliot in his poem "The Four Quartets" says

"I said to my soul, be still, and wait without hope

For hope would be hope for the wrong thing; wait without love,

For love would be love of the wrong thing; there is yet faith

But the faith and the love and the hope are all in the waiting."

Faith,Hope and Love are in waiting. Not only in waiting but poet suggests a sort of perpetual waiting. In "Tall Man Small Shadow" this poem has been quoted from an existentialist point of view.

Use of Sex Symbols in Waiting for Godot:

Carrot:

ESTRAGON 
Fancy that. (He raises what remains of the carrot by the stub of leaf, twirls it before his eyes.) Funny, the more you eat the worse it gets.
VLADIMIR 
With me it's just the opposite. 

Vladimir and Estragon have a relationship which seems to be more than friendship. Temperamentally they are different, but they are bound by some invisible bond which could be Sex. There are subtle hints for that.

Firstly, the waiting itself can be seen as an impotent act. Vladimir is sterile and suffers erectile dysfunction. His offer of carrot is symbolic . Estragon holds the stub of carrot and by the stub of leaf and twirls it before the eyes, is enough to demonstrate his opinion about Vladimir impotency.

Fly:

Estrogon's unbuttoned fly is not simple abrupt humour. It has some implications. It could be pain and suffering caused by sexual incompetence. T. S. Eliot has ridiculed sterile relationship and mechanisation of sexual act in The Wasteland'.Similarly, Beckett also makes a mockery of meaninglessness and uselessness of fly in sterile relationship.Vladimir seems to be suggesting something more when he said "Never ignore little things in life". It may be his pain or suffering for being ignored due to "little thing".

Pants Off:

In the end of the play the last conversation which usually concludes the theme of the play is:

Vladimir: Pull on your trousers.
Estrogon: What?
Vladimir: Pull on your trousers.
Estrogon: You want me to pull off my trousers.
Vladimir: Pull on your trousers.

As if the audience is also being asked to buckle up their pants since the show is over.



© Vipin Behari Goyal

Advocate, Rajasthan High Court, Jodhpur, India 

A Tale of Castrated Bull

                        Existentialism, Feminism, Marxism, Post-Colonialism and Psychoanalysis of Bull

He starts from point A every morning and by the time of evening when his eyes are uncovered, he finds himself again at point A. But he has a sort of satisfaction that he had a long journey that day, maybe he missed the scenery on the way, but the satisfaction and smile on the face of his master tells that he has really performed well. This had been his routine for many years and he has walked thousands of miles, and if his blindfolds were not removed every night, he would have thought himself to be on the other end of the Earth. Thankfully, his master took great care of him after his work was done, massaged him, gave fodder, gave him a bath if required, and saw that he was comfortably settled in the stable. At his Bovine family, he was looked upon as someone drafted for good and not only his mature counterparts of the opposite sex, but even the heifers could know that he was good for nothing and turned their faces away, when he grazed with them in the pastures. He cannot forgive the one who had one fine morning removed his vital part to convert him into that which changed his destiny. And he could do nothing about it. God was great, but man was mischievous.

Now nothing matters. All beautiful heifers have no meaning for him. Even his nose is permanently obliterated to identify estrus. May be his long walk would lead him to land where he would regain his lost bullhood.

How strange it is that his female counterparts never claimed that equality with them that his master's wife always demanded with her husband. His counterpart females were contended with milking, propagation and ultimately being served as beef. Not that he finds any difference in the life of his female counterparts and that of his master's wife. The comparison is endless and he was astounded with parities. The only thing he doesn't know is that his master's wife would be chopped when she goes sterile or they would wait even longer, when she is finally of no use. If this disease of equality spreads in his bovine family, he is sure it is going to create a havoc. His cousin and even his real younger brother were spared by his master, who only gelded him of his vitality. His neutrality of gender had made him stoically neutral towards all issues pertaining to life- or even death for that purpose.

His endless walk is very purposeful. He knows by the smell of sesame, groundnut and mustard. Many times master or his little son has exclaimed with happiness. Once master told his son  the story of Sisyphus. He was a king who could even cheat the God of death. He was ultimately condemned to drag the boulder uphill and let it roll down and then drag it up again till eternity. The child had innocently asked "Is our Joe (well, that's his name) also Sisyphus"? He was very intent to know what his master thinks about him. But like all masters he too laughed it off. No good master should reveal his true opinion about his servants. A confused servant serves a better purpose than an opined servant.

Once he met a maverick colleague in the grass field. He was liberated by his master, but he was feeling abandoned.  He felt desolate and rejected due to identity crisis. He always took pride in being owned by his master, though when he was serving, he always cursed his master for being cruel and hard task master. Now when he was independent he remembered all the good qualities of his master. How much care he took of him, kept him warm in chilling winters and fed him good fodder even when he fell sick. Others took pity on him and tried to help him out, but he was also too arrogant to accept the help of others. Everybody thought he had no future, till one winter evening a lady who looked affluent by her carriage and dress, stopped near him. She found he was shivering so she asked his coach to find out that if there is no owner, he should be provided with shelter and fodder. Liberation always leads to some other kind of slavery. Frankly speaking, there is no true liberation. One amazing thing he found was that these affluent people always had a lot of pity for all types of our kind, but little or no mercy for their own kind. After some time he found that his colleague waited anxiously for the lady to take his care. He had gained good health, there was meat on his bones and he looked more well fed than his fellow grazers. What he did not know was that a group of wolves from nearby woods was making a conspiracy to attack on him at night.

Thankfully, he(Joe) had a short memory. Most of the time he lived in present and had no obsession to repeat what has happened in the past or to dream about what may happen in future. He could retrieve a few things from the immediate past, but that was all. He was truly happy with kind of mind set. He disliked his master when he mentioned very old incidents with great fondness or talk about prosperous future which would never come. He saw his short memory as a boon. It not only saved him from the vices of revenge, greed and anger, but also, prevented him from making silly mistakes like his master, who sometimes forgot to cover him with a blanket in the cold winter night and he had to shiver the whole night. May be he wanted to punish him for walking lethargically that day.

{The oxen are still being used in rural India to extract oil from oilseeds, where ox goes around an improvised wooden grinding machine. The oilcakes formed after extraction of oil are consumed by human as well as animals.}

© Vipin Behari Goyal

Excerpts from his unpublished book  'World is Conical'

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"World is Conical" (Part ii)

The whole community could be wrong in perceiving a fact. Majority cannot be the criterion for determination of Truth. Many of the notions with the advancement of civilization have changed drastically and taboos turn into fad and superstitions are proved scientifically.

What is condemned today is revered tomorrow. What is mutiny for one country is revolution for another country. Why someone had to say Everything is fair in Love and War. And War there is, since Love is also having all the ingredients of war. The purpose is to gain a victory which is a stepping stone for Happiness.

According to John Stuart Mill  happiness is the sole basis of morality, and that people never desire anything but happiness. The people's achievement of goals and ends, such as virtuous living, should be counted as part of their happiness. The determination of Goal is a prerogative of all individuals, communities, cultures, ethnic groups and organizations. The rights of unorganized sectors are usually ignored by capitalists who configures Spherical Excess of this Spherical Triangle called World.

The unorganized sector has a hidden agenda. It needs to be discussed with an open mind and resolved with compassion. Instead of that the Capitalist Cruel Cons (CCC) draw sadistic pleasure in not only making Poor Poorer but also in making them crawl for meager means of survival.

Moreover, they feel offended if oppressed try to unite or try to draw the attention of the World towards their problem. The problems all over the World have become complicated by external intervention. The intervention is not with the pious objective of resolving a problem, but with some ulterior motive of taking advantage of some God gift like Oil or Diamonds or for selling weapons which also indirectly helps in occupying natural resources.

This greed is the sole cause of violence the humanity is facing today.

Fire and Ice

Fire and Ice

Some say the world will end in fire,

Some say in ice.

From what I’ve tasted of desire

I hold with those who favor fire.

But if it had to perish twice,

I think I know enough of hate

To say that for destruction ice

Is also great

And would suffice.

Remember what Robert Frost said in his Poem "Fire and Ice"

Some say the world will end in fire,
Some say in ice.
From what I've tasted of desire
I hold with those who favor fire.
But if it had to perish twice,
I think I know enough of hate
To say that for destruction ice
Is also great
And would suffice.

Sun Tzu in his book 'Art of War' says

"Emerge from the void, strike at vulnerable points, shun places that are defended, attack in unexpected quarters"

"Attack him where he is unprepared, appear where you are not expected."

Even if despite Police protection, several threatening and  warnings the attackers succeed, despite a Police cordon one can escape it raises doubt about who is more organized and intelligent. If we have a history of appeasement the morale of law enforcement agency is already jeopardized.

Every one has a right to be more sensitive than others on certain issues. When advantage of this weakness is taken by one agency to earn popularity and money, it opens the door for another party to exploit your vulnerability. How the pain of one could be different from the pain of another when all shoes are pinching.

Mill in Utilitarianism says "The sentiments of justice, in that one of its elements which consists of the desire to punish, is thus, I conceive, the natural feeling of retaliation or vengeance, rendered by intellect and sympathy applicable to those injuries, that is, to those hurts, which wound us through, or in common with, society at large."

He concludes "Things appear either just or unjust, according to the light in which they are regarded."

What if we retrospect with an open mind and identify the acts that are responsible for our present situation, we may acknowledge the choices and free will Sartre talks about were not only applicable to individuals but nations also.

© Vipin Behari Goyal

Excerpts from his unpublished book "World is Conical"