Write an essay on Waiting for Godot by Beckett. Your essay should be your interpretation of the play based on your own ideas and opinions or perhaps what we learned/discussed in class. Support your arguments by citing different parts of the dialogue or . from different parts of the play.
Here are two examples to give you an idea.
A. Do you think that WAITING FOR GODOT could be considered a Christian or an Anti-Christian play?
Include the following as you are writing your essay, if relevant:
What are the Christian themes in this play?
Waiting is one of the central themes of the play. What do you think it means?
Godot is, of course, the great “absent presence” in the play. What is his role? What does it represent?
What roles do Lucky and Pozzo play?
Who are Vladimir and Estragon? What roles each one of them plays?
Is HOPE present or absent in the lives of the main characters? Why or why not?
How is time presented in this play?
Why did Beckett choose to have his characters on a bare stage with one tree?
What does the boy represent in WAITING FOR GODOT?
What is the condition of man in this world in WAITING FOR GODOT?
If Godot is indeed GOD, what kind of God is Beckett portraying?
B. Is this an existentialist play or not? If so does it fit the ideas of Sartre or the ideas of Camus?
Show evidence proving that “WAITING FOR GODOT” is an existentialist play:
Include the following as you are writing your essay, if relevant:
1. In his essay on Existentialism and Humanism, Sartre characterizes the human condition with three terms: anguish, abandonment, and despair. Do you see these components present in this play? Show how:
2. Could the characters in the play be considered absurd hero according to the existentialist definition of the word.
3. Show signs of Alienation in this play:
4. Do Vladimir and Estragon have Bad Faith?
5. Mankind has free will. Is this true when it comes to the characters of this play:
6. Do any of the characters represent the Absurd Hero as Camus describes it in the Myth of Sisyphus?
7. “Existence precedes essence”.
