Waiting for Godot  (English, Electronic book text, Beckett Samuel)

Two men contemplate suicide while they wait indefinitely for a man named Godot in Samuel Beckett’s most famous play, Waiting for Godot.

Summary of the Book

Two men, Vladimir and Estragon, meet near a leafless tree and begin to speak about how their actions are fruitless. They are waiting for a third man named Godot, and they are unsure how long they have been waiting here. They are not even sure if this is the day Godot is going to show, but only that Godot will appear near a leafless tree. As the evening passes, Godot fails to appear and a strange man appears on a leash. He is a slave, belonging to an aggressive and pompous man named Pozzo. After these men leave, a mysterious boy appears to tell Vladimir and Estragon that Godot won’t appear that evening but he will surely be there the next. However, the two men begin to suspect that they have met the boy before. Nevertheless, they wait as they have always done, they wait for a man who doesn’t show up, the man called Godot. This play is considered to be an allegory on society, politics and religion, despite the author’s own interpretation that it is merely a symbiosis of sorts.

About Samuel Beckett

Samuel Barclay Beckett was an Irish novelist, playwright, poet and theatre director. A Nobel laureate, Beckett is considered to be one of the last modernists and one of the first postmodernists.

Among his other plays, one can find similar absurdist themes in Endgame, Krapp’s Last Tape and Happy Days.

This play has been produced several dozen times throughout the years, and has starred many notable veteran actors, including Sir Ian McKellen and Sir Patrick Stewart, who performed at the Haymarket Theatre in London's West End.