The Loss of Self in Beckett’s Waiting for Godot - Fahmida Akhter & Meria Nusrat Sarkar

Abstract : Beckett’s Waiting for Godot encapsulates man’s loss of the self after the Second World War in Europe. At that time people face so much terror that they start to feel nothingness in everything. Life becomes vulnerable in the complex post-world war era. In this play, the characters deal with humanity’s crucial challenge of existential crisis concerning futility that leads towards the temptation of committing suicide in a meaningless world of absurdity. Waiting for Godot represents uncertainty, nothingness and identity crisis of the characters particularly the characters of Vladimir and Estragon. However, Beckett makes the plot limited and open ended to show the absurdity of human existence. Hence, this study aims to explore the existential crisis of the characters to show how they lose themselves in the post-World War II time. Additionally, in order to explore the loss of the self and existential crisis of the characters, this paper emphasizes on the various aspects of existential philosophy and theory. In line with the research objective, this study incorporates a qualitative research design using ‘textual analysis’ as its primary methodological approach. Through a ‘close reading’ of the text, the study uses existentialism as its theoretical basis. Keywords: Self, Existential Crisis, Godot, World War, Europe