Quick questions on Samuel Beckett's Waiting for Godot: HSC Drama elective

Premiered. Theatre de Babylone, Paris, 5 January 1953, directed by Roger Blin, in French (En attendant Godot). The play was published in French in 1952 and in English in 1954. The English-language premiere was at the Arts Theatre, London, 3 August 1955, directed by Peter Hall.

Vladimir (Didi). The more thoughtful and articulate of the two. Worries about time, theology, and whether they are doing the right thing. Cannot remember things consistently. Wears a bowler hat.

The play opens with Estragon trying to take off his boot. "Nothing to be done." Vladimir enters. They discuss the boots, Estragon's beating, and whether they are at the right place.

The next day. The tree has gained four or five leaves. The boots are still on the stage. Estragon does not remember the day before.

Two-act structure. Beckett chose two acts deliberately. He told Alan Schneider (the American director): "One act would have been too little, three acts would have been too many." Two acts establish repetition without insisting on infinite repetition.

Beckett wrote in French first, then translated himself into English. The English is famously rhythmic and exact. Key features:

Waiting. The play is about the experience of waiting. The audience waits with the characters. The wait is structured, repetitive, and ultimately unrewarded.

Existentialist. The play dramatises Camus's position on the absurd. Vladimir and Estragon are Camus's Sisyphus: condemned to repeat, choosing nevertheless to continue.

Waiting for Godot is the most commonly studied Absurdist play in the HSC Drama elective. Strong essays on Theatre of the Absurd typically anchor in Godot and reference one or two other Absurdist plays. Strong essays cite specific scenes (Lucky's monologue, the Boy's arrivals, Pozzo's speech on time, the "let's go" endings).

Theatre de Babylone, Paris, 5 January 1953, directed by Roger Blin, in French (En attendant Godot). The play was published in French in 1952 and in English in 1954. The English-language premiere was at the Arts Theatre, London, 3 August 1955, directed by Peter Hall.

Sydney, 1957. Numerous subsequent productions including the Sydney Theatre Company (1999, with John Bell and Bille Brown), the Sydney Theatre Company (2013, with Hugo Weaving and Richard Roxburgh), and many others.

Beckett's estate (the Beckett Trustees) is famously strict about adherence to his stage directions. Productions that have departed substantially (single-gender casts, non-traditional staging) have sometimes been refused performance rights.

The more thoughtful and articulate of the two. Worries about time, theology, and whether they are doing the right thing. Cannot remember things consistently.

The more physical and forgetful of the two. Worries about food, sleep, his boots, and his unspecified pains. Has been beaten before the play opens.

A landowner in Act I, blind in Act II. Travels with Lucky on a rope. Brings a picnic of chicken bones in Act I.