But it is clear that they are fairly well-educated, given their vocabularies and frames of reference.ДЄnd yet, cutting across their philosophical and theological discussions is their plain-speaking and unpretentious attitude to these topics. Precisely what social class Vladimir and Estragon come from is not known. The other well-known thing about Waiting for Godot is that Vladimir and Estragon are tramps вЂ“ except that the text never mentions this fact, and Beckett explicitly stated that he вЂsawвЂ™ the two characters dressed in bowler hats (otherwise, he said, he couldnвЂ™t picture what they should look like): hardly the haggard and unkempt tramps of popular imagination. The key lies not so much in the what as in the how. So, what made BeckettвЂ™s play so innovative to 1950s audiences? And plays in which вЂnothing happensвЂ™ were already established by this point, with conversation and meandering and seemingly aimless вЂactionвЂ™ dominating other twentieth-century plays. As Michael Patterson observes in The Oxford Guide to Plays (Oxford Quick Reference), the theme of promised salvation which never arrives had already been explored by a number of major twentieth-century playwrights, including Eugene OвЂ™Neill ( The Iceman Cometh) and EugГЁne Ionesco ( The Chairs). However, contrary to popular belief, this is not what made Waiting for Godot such a revolutionary piece of theatre. It is always just beyond the horizon, in the future, arriving вЂtomorrowвЂ™. With this structure in mind, it is hardly surprising that the play is often interpreted as a depiction of the pointless, uneventful, and repetitive nature of modern life, which is often lived in anticipation of something which never materialises. The вЂactionвЂ™ of the second act mirrors and reprises what happens in the first: Vladimir and Estragon passing the time waiting for the elusive Godot, Lucky and Pozzo turning up and then leaving, and the Boy arriving with his message that Godot will not be coming that day. Waiting for Godot is often described as a play in which nothing happens, twice. After Lucky has performed a dance for them, he is ordered to think: an instruction which leads him to give a long speech which only ends when he is wrestled to the ground. He eats a picnic, and Vladimir requests that Lucky entertain them while they wait for Godot to arrive.

Pozzo tells them that he is on his way to the market, where he intends to sell Lucky. In order to pass the time while they wait for Godot to arrive, the two men talk about a variety of subjects, including how they spent the previous night (Vladimir passed his night in a ditch being beaten up by a variety of people), how the Crucifixion of Jesus Christ is described in the different Gospels, and even whether they should hang themselves from the nearby tree.ДЄ man named Pozzo turns up, leading Lucky, his servant, with a rope around his neck like an animal.

The setting is a country road, near a leafless tree, where two men, Vladimir and Estragon, are waiting for the arrival of a man named Godot. The вЂplotвЂ™ of Waiting for Godot is easy enough to summarise.

Waiting for godot themes