Contents
Chapter 1 The times and environment of Waiting for Godot 4
1.1The creation of theatre of the absurd. 4
1.2 The meaning of the drama for the contemporary audiences. 5
Chapter2 The symbol of Godot 10
2.2 The “me” inside everybody’s mind. 11
2.3 The meaningless life need “Godot” to be waited for 12
2.4 All mankind of all times live under paradox just like the symbol of “Godot”. 14
Abstract
Waiting for Godot, written by the Irish writer Samuel Beckett, is widely regarded as the representative of the Theatre of the Absurd. The absurd theme of the play is used to reflect the meaningless of human life. The theme of the play is waiting rather than Godot. Comparing the play with the reality, we can find the painful waiting not only exists in the play, but also constitutes the basic part of human life. The hope brought by “waiting” is extremely important for the existence and development of human beings.
I divide my thesis into two main parts. The first part is the times and environment of Waiting for Godot. In this part, I will introduce the creation of theatre of absurd, the meaning of this play and the nihilism. Nihilism has been present in Western culture for many centuries, but no century has been so permeated by nihilism as has our own. The second part includes the hope from God, the “me” inside everybody’s mind, the meaningless life need “Godot” to be waited for, and all mankind of all times live under paradox just like the symbol of “Godot”.
Key words: Godot; symbol; hope; human life
摘要
爱尔兰作家赛缪尔·贝克特的《等待戈多》被认为是荒诞派戏剧的代表作。本剧的荒诞主题是用来反映人类生活的毫无意义。剧本的主题是等待而不是戈多。如果我们把剧本与现实相比较，我们就会发现痛苦的等待不仅存在于剧中，也构成了人类生活的基本成分。由“等待”带来的希望对人类的生存和发展极其重要。尽管这是一个“没有希望”的希望，但它能减轻我们的痛苦，给我们提供一幅美好未来的图景。
我把本文分为两个主要部分。第一个是等待戈多的时代与环境在这一部分，我介绍了荒诞派的发展和虚无主义的意义。虚无主义在西方文化存在几个世纪，但是没有一个世纪都弥漫着虚无主义。第二部分是来自上帝的希望，无意义的人生需要戈多来等待，以及所有戈多这个意向的矛盾性。
关键词：戈多，象征，希望，人类生活
