Alex Nicolson
A more Optimistic view.
Geoggrey brought up the idea that the play is about nothing at all, and the general meaninglessness of the human condition, and I believe that while that is certainly a part of the play, I do not think that it is all there is to the play. That being said, I really have no idea what the play is about, but I am sure it is more than just that. Some themes/thoughts I have had particularly relate to the relationships between and within the 2 pairs of characters we see.
Estragon and Vladimir bound to each other by a common need to meet Godot. IT is unclear if they knew one another before they set out on this shared mission, but over the many twilights they have waited for Godot, they have become fast friends, bordering on the sort of relationship often found in married couples. They often finish each others' thoughts and seem to both be thinking from the same consciousness. They do of course have their differences: Vladimir's logic vs. Estragon's complaints, for instance, but they complement each other well. Particularly when they talk of hanging themselves in act one, it sounds almost like two lovers, unwilling to leave the other behind, as demonstrated here.
Vladimir: You're my only hope.
Estragon: Gogo light-bough not break-Gogo dead. Didi heavy-bough break-Didi alone.
Once Estragon realizes the possibility that Vladimir might be left alone without him, he quickly gives up that line of thinking. Their use of pet names for each other, Didi and Gogo, also suggest a long and intimate relationship, as does their embracing at several points in the play.
Lucky and Pozzo, on the other hand, have none of this tenderness. However, they seem to have been together for a similarly long period of time, and their bond, while based on cruelty and subservience instead of friendship, seems to be equally strong. Neither could survive without the other. Lucky needs someone to give him orders, and Pozzo needs someone to order.
The interaction between the two pairs is telling as well. While they come from very different backgrounds and seem to have very different views of the world, they quickly bond, any company is better than no company, it would seem. Here I think Beckett is trying to say something about the nature of our relationships with other humans: we all live in the same world, no matter how bland and absurd it may be, it is the people we encounter that make the world. The set and visual world we are presented with it bleak and detail-less, the only thing the play concerns itself with is the human beings on the stage. As Vladimir says, in what is perhaps the most important speech of the play,
"Let us do something, while we have the chance! It is not every day that we are needed. Not indeed that we personally are needed. Others would meet the case equally well, if not better. To all mankind they were addressed, those cries for help still ringing in our ears! But at this place, at this moment in time, all mankind is us, whether we like it or not. Let us make the most of it, before it is too late!"
It is in this moment onstage, and in this moment as we read the play, and in every moment wherever anyone is existing, that we must do something, while we have the chance, before it is too late. Be it waiting for Godot, or watching a play, or encountering random strangers by a tree on a country road, it is our duty as human beings to represent our race and not stand idly by, even if we are helping just to fight boredom, or even if we do not help, the point is simply to do something. Even if something is nothing. So the play is still about nothing, sometimes, but it is more importantly about continuing on through the monotony of our existence, for as boring as it is, the people around us make it interesting, be they our friends or slave drivers, or strangers on the street.