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Self-conscious Theatricality and Meaning(lessness) in Waiting for Godot

Self-conscious Theatricality and Meaning(lessness)
in Waiting for Godot


The many moments in Waiting for Godot that exhibit a self-conscious theatricality, that are aware of themselves as examples of performance, have a relationship with the concept of meaning that functions on two levels. On one level, they are meaningless, or they simply pass the time, so when characters are aware that they are telling a story or when they engage in speeches and conversations for their own sake, they are telling the audience nothing. They thereby demonstrate how many different kinds of performances can offer nothing to an audience in the way of any kind of meaning or objective truth. The many performances that deal with subject matter like that of science, religion, philosophy, nationalism, and theater itself demonstrate how each of these discourses fails to deliver the kind of revelations or objective truths the audience has come to see, the kinds of meaning on which most people are d...

Posted by: Asare Mabel

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