Preview

Waiting for Godot - Summary

Satisfactory Essays
Open Document
Open Document
536 Words
Grammar
Grammar
Plagiarism
Plagiarism
Writing
Writing
Score
Score
Waiting for Godot - Summary
Waiting for Godot – A Tragic Comedy in Two Acts

Playwright: Samuel Beckett

Important Dates:

1948 - First written in French titled ‘En attendant Godot'
1952 - French version first published
1953 - English version published titled ‘Waiting for Godot'
1954 - First performance at the Theatre de Babylone in Paris
1955 - English language premiere at the Arts Theatre London
1956 - Performed in the United States

Characters:

Vladimir (Didi) - A beggar like man who wears ill-fitting boots and is concerned with bodily matters such as hunger and sleep. Always wants to leave Vladimir, has a notoriously poor memory and tendency to fall asleep and dream.

Estragon (Gogo) - A beggar like man who has intellectual concerns, serves as the mouthpiece for the pair and is terrified of being left alone.

Pozzo - A bossy figure who passes by Estragon and Vladimir accompanied by his slave Lucky, who Pozzo plans to sell at the markets. He meets the Estragon and Vladimir on his way to the market in the first act. In the second act, a blind Pozzo meets the pair again on his way back from the fair not remembering meeting Vladimir and Estragon the night before.

Lucky - Pozzo's slave who is always weighed down with Pozzo's many possessions. Lucky provides entertainment with dancing and ‘thinking' in Act I. In Act II he is dumb. Despite his apparently miserable condition, he desperately wants to remain Pozzo's slave.

Boy - A messenger that appears at the end of each act to tell Vladimir and Estragon that Godot will not come today, but surely tomorrow. The boy always says his brother came yesterday to deliver the message, not him.

Godot – The man Vladimir and Estragon wait on endlessly throughout the whole duration of the play. Godot never appears in the play.

Summary:

Two men, Vladimir and Estragon await the arrival of a man called Godot on a country road with a single tree present. They devise games in which can help them pass the time for most of the

You May Also Find These Documents Helpful

  • Good Essays

    Boy is Dunstan’s doppelgänger, his inverse in every way, especially in their physical appearances and their value of religion and spirituality. Boy is handsome and successful by any measurable societal sense, yet insatiable, going on to end his own life while wrecking the lives of Leola and his children throughout the novel. Boy gradually drifts from religion until he becomes totally spiritually empty and so spiritually deprived his greatest wish is suicide. Boy never addresses his shadow, unlike Dunstan, and so he dies an incomplete, unhappy man. This contrasts Dunstan at the end of the novel who is quickly closing in on his own individuation thanks to his ugly, wise…

    • 1041 Words
    • 5 Pages
    Good Essays
  • Good Essays

    Micheal Pollan's "Playing God in the Garden" addresses the many unseen aspects of farming and the technologies that are being designed to make planting effortless and safe. Pollan discusses how New Leaf (the plant company which has created the new biotechnological seeds) advertises a safer and less expensive way of farming, while concealing the harmful aspects of its product.…

    • 496 Words
    • 2 Pages
    Good Essays
  • Satisfactory Essays

    R&J Study Guide

    • 796 Words
    • 4 Pages

    * He is the prince of Verona. In other words he is like the mayor or a peace keeper…

    • 796 Words
    • 4 Pages
    Satisfactory Essays
  • Good Essays

    He is the boy who had the idea of building the huts on the beach (shelter), encourages to keep the fire going, organized what each boy will be responsible for, and making a clock to use it as a reference during the day.…

    • 1488 Words
    • 6 Pages
    Good Essays
  • Better Essays

    Killing / Fiesta, 1980

    • 1575 Words
    • 7 Pages

    In the story written by Dubus, Matt Flower, the main character symbolizes the loving father. He was very protective of his children when they were younger:…

    • 1575 Words
    • 7 Pages
    Better Essays
  • Powerful Essays

    Les Miserables Analysis

    • 1739 Words
    • 7 Pages

    Hannah Kent, in Burial Rites and Billie August in Les Miserables explore a variety of injustices as a product of prejudice by revealing the flaws of their Nineteenth Century social system. Although Kent released her novel in the 21st century, she thoroughly presents Nineteenth Century Iceland in all its formidable culture of prejudice and hardship to the same extent that August explores Nineteenth Century France in Les Miserables. Though both authors propose that one’s preconception of another rests in the position of their social class, August presents that as one’s social class changes, the prejudice changes towards them changes. This is different to Kent as she entices the readers to see the nature of men and their prejudice towards women…

    • 1739 Words
    • 7 Pages
    Powerful Essays
  • Good Essays

    Titus andronicus

    • 350 Words
    • 2 Pages

    "Aaron the Moor" is Tamora's secret lover and the diabolical mastermind behind the plan to destroy the Andronicus family.…

    • 350 Words
    • 2 Pages
    Good Essays
  • Better Essays

    The novel Hoot tells the story of new kid Roy Eberhardt and his struggles to adjust to his new home of Coconut Grove, Florida. As he tries to do this, he goes on a crazy journey with two other kids, as they try to protect burrowing owls and their habitat from the construction of a pancake house.…

    • 1311 Words
    • 6 Pages
    Better Essays
  • Satisfactory Essays

    Cupid is a motif in the play, but he does not play a positive role he makes everything more complicated and harder for the kids. Cupid is often thought as a baby or a toddler that shoots people with…

    • 422 Words
    • 2 Pages
    Satisfactory Essays
  • Good Essays

    Inherit The Wind Summary

    • 752 Words
    • 4 Pages

    The trial of Bertram Cates revolved around the concept of religion as part of school curriculum. The people of Hillsboro truly believed in the teaching of religion in public schools, whereas Bertram Cates and Henry Drummond did not believe religion was part of the necessary curriculum and thought evolution was a valid explanation for the creation of life. The duty of teachers is to educate and inform young minds about the real world and how past events relate to today’s society. Inherit the Wind describes the proper role of education as religion based and central to Catholic beliefs. The view on religion in public classrooms has greatly changed, shifting more towards an open curriculum. Inherit the Wind raises the question of classroom regulations…

    • 752 Words
    • 4 Pages
    Good Essays
  • Satisfactory Essays

    Mr. Rizzo is a man filled with knowledge, skills and more. I believe that if Mr. Rizzo were to be an inanimate object, he would be a book. In my personal opinion, Mr. Rizzo would be a book because there are plenty of things that you…

    • 875 Words
    • 4 Pages
    Satisfactory Essays
  • Good Essays

    Humans are collectivist animals. Meaning, humans must constantly seek each other for assistance and comfort in order to carry on their everyday lives. However, because dependence is one of many crucial basic needs, it has found its spot only in people’s deepest, unconscious memories. However, in Samuel Beckett’s Waiting for Godot, the writer utilizes his primary characters in order to emphasize the integral role of dependence in relationships; he ultimately proposes that humans must depend on each other for them to socially thrive.…

    • 597 Words
    • 3 Pages
    Good Essays
  • Better Essays

    The Betrothed

    • 1087 Words
    • 5 Pages

    Lorenzo is a young peasant whose wedding is prevented by Don Rodrigo. Renzo is generous, good-hearted, and abrupt. He is separated from Lucia so they can be safe. She goes to Monza and he goes to Milan. Renzo never makes it to the safe haven but instead gets into some trouble in the city, causes a riot, gets arrested, and then flees the city with a price on his head. He locates some family members in Venice but has to flee again and finally settles in a different town but with a different name. He is still in contact with Lucia by letters they send to each other; after a while he returns to Milan and contracts the disease, once he is well he continues his search for Lucia. He finds her at a pesthouse because she also has contracted the plague but after her recovery they go back to their old town and finally get married by Don Abbondio. Renzo is determined to find the love of his life and went through hell and back to finally reach her.…

    • 1087 Words
    • 5 Pages
    Better Essays
  • Satisfactory Essays

    crazy Ibsen

    • 747 Words
    • 3 Pages

    1: A Comparison of Minor Characters: Buinovsky in One Day in the Life of Ivan Denisovich and Dr. Rank in A Doll’s House…

    • 747 Words
    • 3 Pages
    Satisfactory Essays
  • Satisfactory Essays

    Vladimir Putin

    • 347 Words
    • 1 Page

    The force with which Vladimir Vladimirovich holds the power in their hands, to judge him as a hard man, knows how to make carry out their decisions. Its outer homeliness, cold eyes closed and say that he does not show much, much keeps the "inside" themselves.…

    • 347 Words
    • 1 Page
    Satisfactory Essays