{"id":242,"date":"2008-12-08T00:22:15","date_gmt":"2008-12-08T04:22:15","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/blog.richmond.edu\/script_analysis\/2008\/12\/08\/the-first-reading\/"},"modified":"2008-12-08T00:23:28","modified_gmt":"2008-12-08T04:23:28","slug":"the-first-reading","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/blog.richmond.edu\/script_analysis\/2008\/12\/08\/the-first-reading\/","title":{"rendered":"The First Reading"},"content":{"rendered":"

The First Reading of Waiting for Godot<\/em><\/u><\/strong><\/p>\n

by Logan Turner<\/p>\n

Question 1<\/strong> – There is no climax where the tension snaps.\u00a0 This play is merely two renditions of the same scene, and while things happen during this scene, there is not one large climax; ultimately both end in similar ways.\u00a0 If I had to pick a moment of climax, it would be Estragon and Vladimir’s decision to actually hang themselves, and the decision to use a more suitable object (the rope) if Godot does not come on the third day.<\/p>\n

Question 2<\/strong> – The two sides of the tension that snapped were Godot not showing up on the second day, and whether or not the two tramps would decide to actually carry out their next suicide plan.<\/p>\n

Question 3<\/strong> – It has worked throughout the play because everyone, the audience included, has been wondering who Godot is and whether or not he will actually show up (after Act I), and wondering on if the tramps will actually end their miserable lives.<\/p>\n

Question 4\u00a0& 5<\/strong>\u00a0– I think that the point in the play that the driving force emerged was\u00a0when Estragon and Vladimir first arrive at the tree and know that they are there for a reason, and are waiting for a man named Godot, and NOTHING else.\u00a0 The fact that they know so little about their own situation acts as the driving force.\u00a0 This driving force, is in turn, resisted by two things.\u00a0 One, the fact that no one knows if\/when Godot will actually come (especially after Act I), or if he really exists!\u00a0 And two, whether or not they will actually commit suicide, because if they do they will never gain any more knowledge of their situation.<\/p>\n

Question 6<\/strong> – Yes, the climax moments in the individual scenes are very<\/em> important to the overall tension of the play.\u00a0 Because each scene ends in almost exactly the same way, the audience is left wondering if they are ever going to see any kind of significant changes between acts.\u00a0 This adds to the steady rise and fall of tension throughout the play, and never really peaking past a certain point\u00a0(and if extrapolated through more Acts would probably stay the same).<\/p>\n

Question 7<\/strong> – Yes, the protagonists of this play are Estragon and Vladimir, equally.\u00a0 They play main roles in causing the audience to think about their situation in two distinct ways: Estragon says things and acts in ways that make you think about the physical world (surroundings, feelings, sounds, etc.); Vladimir says things and acts in ways that make you think about the more emotional side of things (what the world is like, how bad life is, etc.), things that are less personal.<\/p>\n

Question 8<\/strong> – There is not a whole lot of context in this play to cause tension, because there is little information and therefore little context.\u00a0 But, a few things that seem to cause tension are: the fact the neither the characters nor the audience can ever see any events or receive any information about the world beyond the setting where this play takes place (a road\/a tree); and the fact that the audience does not have any background information (context) about the characters or their situation.<\/p>\n

Question 9<\/strong> – The nature of the audience’s involvement, is to get bored.\u00a0 And I mean this in the best way possible, because if they get bored, the get Beckett’s point that life can be very boring and repetitive.<\/p>\n

Question 10<\/strong>\u00a0– The play opens on what seems like a country road, but is also somewhat bizarre.\u00a0 There is a tree on the side of the road, but otherwise the landscape is barren and wasted.\u00a0 We see Estragon sitting on the ground…<\/p>\n

Question 11<\/strong> – In terms of emotional involvement, I don’t think we are asked very much.\u00a0 And this is because you need to not have emotional involvement to understand what Beckett is trying to say about everyday life being so monotonous.\u00a0 We should develop an interest for the characters, but it is never enough to actually care that much about what happens to them, but merely just to see it actually happen, just so we know.\u00a0 I think that the level of Critical Assessment required is much higher than that of emotional involvement.\u00a0 The audience must critically assess everything in this play because there are so few things (people\/places\/significant actions).\u00a0 This play is about subtle changes not really being changes at all, so the audience must pay close attention to see these things and figure out what they mean.<\/p>\n

Question 12<\/strong> – Why did Beckett not write one or two more scenes?<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

The First Reading of Waiting for Godot by Logan Turner Question 1 – There is no climax where the tension snaps.\u00a0 This play is merely two renditions of the same scene, and while things happen during this scene, there is not one large climax; ultimately both end in similar ways.\u00a0 If I had to pick … Continue reading The First Reading<\/span><\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":499,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[862],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-242","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-longman-group-three-what-is-it-about"],"jetpack_featured_media_url":"","_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/blog.richmond.edu\/script_analysis\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/242","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/blog.richmond.edu\/script_analysis\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/blog.richmond.edu\/script_analysis\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/blog.richmond.edu\/script_analysis\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/499"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/blog.richmond.edu\/script_analysis\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=242"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/blog.richmond.edu\/script_analysis\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/242\/revisions"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/blog.richmond.edu\/script_analysis\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=242"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/blog.richmond.edu\/script_analysis\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=242"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/blog.richmond.edu\/script_analysis\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=242"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}