Download - There’s Lots of Time in Godot’
‘There’s Lots of Time in Godot’
Richard Schechner
Form… • The form is a spinning away, a centrifugal wheel in which the
center –Time- can barely hold the parts
• Godot is at the center of the play and outside it at the same time
Paralysis… tied…clichés • “I don’t seem to be able … to depart”, Pozzo says
• Vladimir and Estragon have definite appointments they must keep while Pozzo and Lucky are aimless, not tied to anything but each other
• Lucky’s speech is uncontrollable stream of consciousness. Pozzo’s comments are sets of set speeches, learned long time ago
Couples…• In Waiting for Godot, there are meaningful differences
between Vladimir and Estragon, Pozzo and Lucky; but even these shadings of individuation are seen only through the couple: to know one character, one needs to know both
Avoiding time… • Waiting is what the characters are after but what they want to
avoid most as well
• Their activities are keeping them from consciousness of the action of the play… waiting
What holds the play together?• Time, habit, memory and games form the texture of the play
and provide both its literary and theatrical interest.
Vladimir’s epiphany • Was I sleeping, while the others suffered? Am I sleeping
now? Tomorrow, when I wake, or think I do, what shall I say of today? That with Estragon my friend, at this place, until the fall of night, I waited for Godot? That Pozzo passed, with his carrier, and that he spoke to us? Probably. But in all that what truth will there be?
Realization… • Vladimir knows everything and wishes he did not
• For Pozzo “the same day, the same second” is enough to enfold all human experience
• “tell him you saw me”… habits break, old friends are abandoned
• Pointless execution of orders
Pozzo’s epiphany • Have you not done tormenting me with your accused time! It’s
abominable! When! When! One day, is that not enough for you, one day he went dumb, one day he went blind, one day we’ll go deaf, one day we were born, one day we shall die, the same day the same second, is that not enough for you?
Free Southern Theater Production
Different interpretation!
Games • Thematically meaningless
• Feed into the rich image-texture of the play
• They contribute to the non-plot
Let’s Go!