Waiting for Godot

Two men wait by a tree. Nothing happens. Then nothing happens again. This is either the most boring play ever written or one of the most profound, and Beckett understood that those two possibilities are not mutually exclusive.

Why Start Here

Vladimir and Estragon wait for Godot, who never arrives. While they wait, they talk, bicker, play games, contemplate suicide, encounter a man and his slave, and wait some more. The play is a perfect encapsulation of the human condition as Beckett saw it: we fill time with activity and conversation to avoid confronting the fact that we don’t know why we’re here or what we’re waiting for.

What surprises first-time readers is how funny it is. The dialogue has the rhythm of vaudeville. The two men are Laurel and Hardy doing existentialism. The comedy and the despair are inseparable, which is exactly the point.

What to Expect

A short play (under two hours to read) with almost no conventional plot. Dialogue that circles back on itself and contradicts itself. Two acts that are deliberately similar. An ending that refuses resolution. And, if you let it in, a strange warmth for these two lost souls who keep each other company while they wait.