Samuel Beckett’s Endgame

Samuel Becketts plays atomic number 18 immersed in a post- apocalyptic, grey light that reveals only a sinless landscape with a few stray survivors who are waiting for the end of everything. end game, like Becketts another(prenominal) plays, is situated in a minimalist mount which retains only a few disparate elements of the complex universe as we know it.The world of Endgame is one dominated by absence and emptiness, marked by the characters allusion to the gradual disappearance of things. Despite the apocalyptic setting however, the activity of the world goes on uninterruptedly.Becketts characters are trapped in what seems an infinite postponing of the net ending that would erase the mock simulation of existence that still persists. Although the end of the world seems to have already move onred, a form of support still drags on without any apparent closure or resolution. The essence of Endgame therefore lies in this lack of closure in an already dead universe. As the huma n activity of the play foretells, the text focuses on the final game of existence. This game is incredibly reduced, with only four human characters on the stage and very few other elements.Nevertheless, the game seems to be endless and the characters that play it are forced to continue despite their weariness. The game is nothing else than life itself, in its infinite but monotone flux. The endless repetitions that mark the gestures and the speech of the characters are a representation of the game pattern. The pauses which often interrupt the slow motion of the act appear to be pauses that occur before a movement in the game. Critic Jeevan Kumar observes that the game in Becketts play is a metaphor that reflects life itself.In his view moreover, the game correspond in the play is very similar to a game of chess, but which is characterized by absolute irrationality For Beckett, a game of chess reflects life itself scarce the game of life, unlike a game of chess, is quite irrationa l. Man is a being tossed in the absurd universe like a piece on the chess board, and his fate is as dubious as that of a chessman. (Kumar 545) Thus, Beckett makes recourse to the chess representation in order to portray life in its giddiness and illogicality.As in a game of chess, the characters are forced either to move only in a certain way or to be completely motionless. Hamm is unable to stand up and is confined to his wheelchair, without suffering from an actual physical disability. His obsession with being at the very center of the room is excessively satisfying as it hints to a fixed position on the board. This may also allude to mans place in the universe and his relationship to nature. By contrast, Clov, Hamms servant, is unable to sit down. Hamms old parents are legless and live bottled-up in two ashbins.Position and movement are very important in Becketts plays, as they emphasize the human beings lack of freedom. Life is seen as an entrapping and absurd game, which se ems to offer no escape and no relief. The begin of the play is already an ending, as Clov announces the approach of a finish Clov Finished, its finished, nearly finished, it must be nearly finished. (Beckett 3) significantly, what Clov announces is only the beginning of the end, a state where these two extremities get but where there is no actual conclusion.As Hamm remarks later in the play, the end and the beginning are coincide, but, paradoxically, nothing begins and nothing ends while everything continues Hamm The end is in the beginning and yet you go on. (Beckett 78) It is this absurd waiting and continuation that is at the core of Becketts plays. Life is both a scene of nothingness and one of infinity, and it is this duality that drives the characters in Beckett to desperation. One recurrent phrase in the play sums up this idea.The simple fact of existing on earth is immutable and incurable use your head, cant you, use your head, youre on earth, theres no cure for that (B eckett 78) Endgame therefore transmits the sense of absurdity and desperation in life. The endless repetitions and recurrent images serve to represent life like a game in which the players are trapped. The roles that Clov and Hamm play, common for most of Becketts works, are also significant. The two characters are bound by a curious relationship of dependency which seems unjustified.They are tied to their own roles and positions in the game, which cannot be violated. The game lacks a conclusion and therefore its meaning can never be settled. Life is a game where the human beings seem to wait for life to finally cash in ones chips life. The meaning of life is deferred until its actual ending, and therefore life cannot be lived as an actual existence but only as endless waiting blink of an eye upon moment, pattering down, like the millet grains of(he hesitates) that old Greek, and all life long you wait for that to mount up to a life.(Beckett 80) William S. Haney notes that this li minal world that Beckett describes, where we confront both the ending and the fullness of life is a fusion between absence and plenitude In alluding to the end of the world and all of its contentobjects, time, nature, food, colors, fleas, rats, weather, laughter, kisses, sun, sound, God, and so onbut infinitely deferring this end, Endgame suggests the possibility of experiencing a fusion of fullness and emptiness.(Haney 48) Beckett therefore pinpoints in Endgame the essence of life itself, which is not a flow of events but rather a fusion among many contradictions. Endgame is therefore a representation of life itself as endless waiting of a finish or a conclusion. by dint of images of cyclic movement and repetition, the play emphasizes the idea of life as an endless game. Despite the minimalist setting, the atmosphere of the play is one that fuses absence with fullness. There are very few things resting, and yet the scene seems populated.Nothing actually happens and everything see ms to draw to an end and yet there is no closure, as the last word of the play is the verb to remain Youremain. (Beckett 96) Thus, Endgame portrays life as an infinite and absurd game of waiting, which claws man into its void. Works Cited Beckett, Samuel. Endgame. New York Grove Press, 1959. Haney, William S. , II. Beckett out of his mind the theatre of the absurd. Studies in the literary Imagination. 34. 2 (2001) 39-55. Kumar, K. Jeevan. The chess metaphor in Samuel Becketts Endgame. . Modern Drama. 40. 4 (1997) 540-553.