Act 1
Sense
VLADIMIR: We can still part, if you think it would be better.
ESTRAGON: It’s not worthwhile now.
Silence.
VLADIMIR: No, it’s not worthwhile now.
Silence.
ESTRAGON: Well, shall we go?
VLADIMIR: Yes, let’s go.
They do not move.
Having been with each other for fifty years, Didi and Gogo have become each other’s sense of normalcy. I see this happen all too often, especially with unhappy adults who stay together. These people can’t move on because of things like financial, religious, and societal burdens that have long tied down the relationship. Just like these two, they have blind hope that waiting it out will eventually produce a miraculous change. Without deceive themselves into thinking they’re happier when they’re together. Didi and Gogo will keep on waiting for “Godot” because neither of them wants to separate because they’re so accustomed to one another.
Nonsense
(Estragon with a supreme effort succeeds in pulling off his boot. He peers inside it, feels about inside it, turns it upside down, shakes it, looks on the ground to see if anything has fallen out, finds nothing, feels inside it again, staring sightlessly before him.) Well?
ESTRAGON: Nothing.
VLADIMIR: Show me.
ESTRAGON: There’s nothing to show.
VLADIMIR: Try and put it on again.
I found this part odd because Vladimir is telling Estragon to put on his boots again in hopes that something will appear. From the physicalities of the first bit, the audience can tell that nothing is going to appear out of the boots, yet Vladimir insists that there is something in there. Later, as a way to reassure himself, Vladimir “watches him [Estragon], then goes and picks up the boot, peers into it, drops it hastily.” What is he looking for? And why does he do the same thing with his hat by continuously peering into it and blowing into it?
Act 2
Sense
ESTRAGON: To try him with other names, one after the other. It’d pass the time. And we’d be bound to hit on the right one sooner or later.
VLADIMIR: I tell you his name is Pozzo.
ESTRAGON: We’ll soon see. (He reflects.) Abel! Abel!
POZZO: Help!
ESTRAGON: Got it in one!
VLADIMIR: I begin to weary of this motif.
ESTRAGON: Perhaps the other is called Cain. Cain! Cain!
POZZO: Help!
ESTRAGON: He’s all humanity.
It’s clear to me now that Pozzo represents all of humanity. When I read this part, I realized that Cain and Abel are religious figures. Upon further research, I found out that Cain and Abel are the two sons of Adam and Eve. While Cain was the first to be born, Abel was the first to die. Taking from that ideology, Pozzo’s character symbolizes the good and evil in human nature. For instance, he treats Lucky like a dog and proudly exhibits his excessively gluttonous nature. On the other hand, he also has a childish innocence that appears when he doesn’t have Lucky to help him up or lead him. He’s imperfect, and as Gogo says, “He’s all humanity.”
Nonsense
VLADIMIR: Well I suppose in the end I’ll get up by myself. (He tries, fails.) In the fullness of time.
ESTRAGON: What’s the matter with you?
VLADIMIR: Go to hell.
ESTRAGON: Are you staying there?
VLADIMIR: For the time being.
I found this part to be nonsensical, especially since they’re all grown men who are perfectly capable of getting up on their own. Did they just give up on waiting for Godot? Earlier, they had a whole spiel about how they were going to keep their appointment, and they even made their way back to the same old tree even though Gogo doesn’t remember it. I just thought it was humorous and nonsensical that, even when Dodo fell down, no one seems to have the motivation to get back up. In my mind, I just imagine a weird scene of four men lying on the ground.
