Quot And Scepticism In Samuel Beckett's Waiting For Godot

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“Nothing Is certain when you’re around”: how does Waiting for Godot explore doubt and scepticism?

Samuel Beckett’s Waiting for Godot creates doubt and scepticism throughout the play by inspiring questions within the characters and audience that are never intended to be answered. The play explores the idea of purpose and meaning- or lack thereof - by locking the two main characters in a loop of stagnant and inconsequential dialogue and action. The characters themselves express their own scepticism and doubt relating to meaning, purpose and faith. This essay will explore doubt and scepticism within the play as well as it’s broader influence in instilling similar feelings of uncertainty onto the audience. A large focus of this essay will be exploring the repetitive religious parallels introduced in Waiting for Godot, and how it feeds into the issue of free will. …show more content…

Despite being the title character, he never appears physically on stage, and his actual function beyond suspending Vladimir and Estragon, is never actually explained. What can be understood about Godot is that he is incredibly influential and powerful within the world of the play, often being the answer to Vladimir and Estragon’s many debates. An example of this is when the two men begin to debate whether to commit suicide by hanging themselves from the lone dead tree on stage. The conclusion they reach is to let Godot decide for them, “Vladimir: Let’s see what he says … Godot” . This shows the power of Godot, as he literally has both the lives of the men in his hands, he could choose to let them die, or he could continue to suspend their wait. The men give this power to Godot as they see him as an answer to their uncertainty, in this case the uncertainty stems from the consequences of their

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