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Pozzo:
You are human beings
… [He puts on his glasses.] As far as one can see. [He
takes off his glasses.] Of the same species as myself. [He bursts
into an enormous laugh.]
–
Waiting for Godot
Beckett's characters are not really the sorts of people we are familiar
with from everyday life or traditional drama. But they do have characteristics
that we recognise, and they are not indistinguishable from each other
– as is made clear by Pozzo's laughter at the idea that he, Vladimir
and Estragon are of the same species.
Vladimir and Estragon are to some extent different personalities.
The 'unhappy' but more physically resourceful Estragon increasingly
finds his 'lousy life' intolerable. Vladimir is more emotional, practical
and hopeful: he 'reflects' and 'muses' optimistically.
Winnie in Happy Days, despite her predicament, buried first
up to her waist and then up to her neck in sand, is even more cheerful
and optimistic:
…
no no … can't complain
… no
no
… mustn't
complain
… so
much to be thankful for
… no
pain
… hardly
any
… wonderful
thing that
… slight
headache sometimes
… occasional
mild migraine
… it
comes
… then
goes
… ah
yes
… many
mercies
… great
mercies
… '
Winnie's henpecked husband Willie barely features in Happy Days,
but we often meet two contrasting yet complementary characters in
Beckett's plays, who – like Vladimir and Estragon –
have a sort of mutual dependence. In Waiting for Godot, Pozzo
is a smug materialistic bully, whereas Lucky is abject but capable
of imaginative thought and feeling. Rough for Theatre I features
a blind man and a physically disabled man who consider the possibility
of joining forces in the interests of survival. Act Without Words
II is mimed by the slow and awkward 'A' and the brisk, precise
'B'.
But the names here give the game away. On the whole Beckett provides
minimal information about character identity. In Act Without
Words II, the characters don't speak, and he may also dispense
with a character's sight or bodily action, as in Rough for Theatre
I, or with bodies altogether, blacking them out with long gowns
(Ohio Impromptu) or lighting only the head (Footfalls).
Not I features only a faceless mouth, and in Breath
there is no visual figure at all.
So Beckett reverses traditional character development, increasingly
stripping away details of personality. He is not mainly concerned
with aspects of individual identity, but with what it's like to
be alive and how we try to cope with it. As Vladimir says in Waiting
for Godot: 'At this place, at this moment of time, all mankind
is us.'
So although the characters may not have complex individual identities,
they are deeply human. They are full of self-doubt, chatter to dispel
despair but find little comfort, feel vulnerable, have nowhere to
go, question their predicament, are bored, must continue doing something
simply because they exist, sense the brevity of living and yet feel
it seems interminable, contemplate suicide – and wait fearfully
(for hope is unreliable) for what the end may bring.
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