Blog Post 3, Topic 1

Benjamin Van 

VLADIMIR:

But yesterday evening it was all black and bare. And now it's covered with leaves.

ESTRAGON:

Leaves?

VLADIMIR:

In a single night.

ESTRAGON:

It must be the Spring.

VLADIMIR:

But in a single night!

ESTRAGON:

I tell you we weren't here yesterday. Another of your nightmares.

VLADIMIR:

And where were we yesterday evening according to you?

ESTRAGON:

How would I know? In another compartment. There's no lack of void.

VLADIMIR:

(sure of himself). Good. We weren't here yesterday evening. Now what did we do yesterday evening?

ESTRAGON:

Do?

VLADIMIR:

Try and remember.

ESTRAGON:

Do . . . I suppose we blathered.

VLADIMIR:

(controlling himself). About what?

ESTRAGON:

Oh . . . this and that I suppose, nothing in particular. (With assurance.) Yes, now I remember, yesterday evening we spent blathering about nothing in particular. That's been going on now for half a century.

From these few lines drawn from the play, “Waiting for Godot”, one can realize the copious amounts of repetition found throughout not only through the repetition of plot but also through the repetition of word usage. From the excerpt shown above, the repetition of word usage is evident. Vladimir and Estragon constantly mirror each other’s words. Immediately when Vladimir points out that the tree in the scene has leaves, Estragon repeats his questioning of the leaves as if they were replicas of each other. This simple action is not only found in this excerpt but throughout the entire play as well.

Less obvious but still very prominent is repetition of plot. From the last few lines of the first act, both Vladimir and Estragon agree to leave the scene and not wait for Godot anymore but neither of them move. Moving forward to the end of the second act, once again Vladimir and Estragon bring up the idea of leaving but neither of them set forth. From the lines above, readers can realize that this whole notion repeats itself day to day because the events happening in this second act seem to be from a completely different climate season from the first act. From the appearance of the tree, the first act is during winter time while the second act is from the beginning of spring. Noting that there are now leaves on the tree means that the events of waiting everyday must have happened a lot of times. Particularly, Estragon recalls that they have been waiting for Godot for half a century as shown in the last line.

Although “Waiting for Godot” is a play and not a poem where sentence structure is of more importance, readers are able to detect a discernable pattern from the exchanges between Vladimir and Estragon. Both characters act as mirrors of each other. Sentences exchanged between the two are usually of the same length. Additionally, neither character’s sentences seem to add any substance to the play as well. It is very arguable that this play could be played out by just one character and his internalizing thoughts rather than have Vladimir and Estragon play the parts.

The use of the word blather fits the theme of the play very well. After reading the play, readers get a strong sense of confusion and can’t extract much substance from the play itself besides the main idea of “there are two men who wait by a tree for a man named Godot who never comes.” From the dictionary, blather is defined as “to talk long-windedly without making very much sense.” After doing a close reading of the last line above, we see that not only are the conversations between Vladimir and Estragon seemingly meaningless but the entire play itself lacks meaning.

The idea of repetition additionally manifests itself into a sense of amnesia in the characters. Both Vladimir and Estragon are unable to recall the events of the previous day even though it was less than 24 hours before. This inability to remember additionally reinforces the idea of meaninglessness and lack of substance in the play. Naturally, if something particularly interesting has happened to the characters, they would have been easily to recall it but that does not seem to be the case. Since they are unable to distinguish the days that have gone by from themselves, the memories or lack thereof get lumped together into the past.