Waiting for Godot by Samuel Beckett
Power: 6.5 of 10
Consistency: 9 of 10
Difficulty: 7.5 of 16
Humor: 9 of 10
Waiting for Godot is a play apt to make one laugh, and then think. As with many plays, it is over before you feel it has even begun. But as one reads it, it becomes notable how Beckett’s unique voice sprawls across his canvas with some of the most memorable characters in 20th century theater: a grotesque portrait of a heartless aristocrat and his downtrodden puppy-like victim, yet another straight-man-with-idiot odd couple (one cannot ignore the resemblance to Steinbeck’s ever-resilient George and Lenny), and the strange, schizophrenic voices which haunt them in their silence. A tree looms in the corner, but they can find no rope. It begs the question: is the mad man not the one who is the most sane? Given its post-war context, such a message is not at all surprising. For all of Beckett’s alleged difficulty, Waiting for Godot is probably one of the most accessible works of the post-war generation (it was certainly an easier read than Albee’s Who’s Afraid of Virginia Woolf, but that’s for a different day), easily readable within a few hours, and a perfect introduction to the absurdist tradition for both the layperson and the classroom.
