1-A Study of Absurdity in Samuel Beckett’s Play” Act without Words”

Absurdity
Absurdity is the view of existentialist philosopher that human existence in this universe is
ambiguous and chaotic. In literal sense absurdity is meaninglessness, bizarre, incongruence, silly,
ridiculous and strange. Though it was Beckett who is well know for the theater of the absurd but
basically the word absurd was coined by “Martin Esslin to describe the anti-realistic post-war
drama of playwrights as Beckett, Arthur Adamov and Jean Genet” (Nelson, 1993, p. 67). In
absurdity, no meaning exists in this universe for man, but it is man himself who has to search for
the meaning. Absurdity is in fact a condition where man is compelled to exist without his
individualism in society and hence does not posses any degree of effective communication
(Robert, 1995). In the real sense, man existence cannot escape from being absurd. One cannot
claim that he has some solutions for attaining the life which is without being absurd. Martin Esslin
quoted in Nelson (1993, p. 68) say that absurd is a:
kind of drama that presents a view of the absurdity of the human condition by the
abandoning of usual or rational devices and by the use of nonrealistic
form.…Conceived in perplexity and spiritual anguish, the theater of the absurd
portrays not a series of connected incidents telling a story but a pattern of images
presenting people as bewildered beings in an incomprehensible universe.

The world is actually absurd, which means that there is no meaning or purpose (Esslin,
1961:5). The absurdity comes from the life of human being. Human in the world always tends to
imitate others because some powers have influenced them. People, aware or not, tend to follow
those who have power. The power can be negative when is followed by cruelty and when it causes
frightening events. The condition or state which humans exist in a meaningless, nothingness,
irrational universe wherein people’s lives have no purpose or meaning. Beside that Martin Esslin
mentions, Ionesco's parallel concept of the absurdity: "Absurd is that which is devoid of purpose.
[...]Cut off from his religious, metaphysical, and transcendental roots, man is lost; all his actions
become senseless, absurd, and useless" (Esslin, 1961)

Samuel Becket and Absurdity

Samuel Becket was born in Dublin in 1906. It is said about his father that he was a contractor. His
mother was a nurse. Beckett got his early education from a boarding high school and it was 1923
that he took admission at Trinity College, Dublin from where he got his bachelor degree. There he
read modern languages and that is why joined as an English teacher. Then he served as a lecturer
and taught French at Campbell College, Belfast. In Paris he met James Joyce and started writing
in criticism and poetry. After traveling many countries, at last he settled in Paris and joined writing
as his profession. In his writing, Beckett covered almost every genre of literature, which ranged
from novels to essays, short stories, poetry and criticism. Beckett major work includes three best
plays which are Endgame, Happy days and Waiting for Godot. If Beckett is studied, then most of
his work deals in some manner with some of existentialists’ ideas and absurdity. In fact, Beckett
considers human existence as the continual force of despair and disappointment. In fact it was his
play “Waiting for Godot” wherefrom the idea of the theatre of absurd came. His contribution to
the theatre of absurd is so great that he is considered as the father of theatre of absurd. His play
“Act Without Words can be considered as Absurd play as it reflects some of the aspects of theatre
of the absurd. While keeping in view the elements of absurdity, the study focuses the analysis of
Samuel Beckett’s play “Act without Words” The artistic features of these works such as title,
setting, structure, theme, characters and actions/dialogues are overviewed through the lens of
absurdity. The absurdity appeared was in the form of meaninglessness of life without any goal and
purpose, chaos in life, love for death and emotional and spiritual barren characters.

Absurdity in Title
If we take the very title of the text and compare it with reference to absurdity, then we are
made aware that the title shows the absurd nature of the text. For example, the title “Act
Without Words” reflects absurdity in the sense that it too is full of mystery hence create the
effect of meaninglessness in the title. It is this meaningless which not only makes things
ambiguous but also absurd.

Absurdity in Setting
The setting of the play (desert) is an odd and alien one. The action takes places on a stage sparsely
adorned to resemble a desert. Into this barren landscape appears items one would assume as
necessities: a tree offering meager shade, but shade nonetheless, and a water bottle. Attempts to
enjoy the use of both prove vain. Whoever or whatever is tossing him backwards, kicking over the
boxes and otherwise providing him with on the tantalizing but unreachable solutions to his most
obvious problems can be accurately said to have to deserted all expectations of benevolence. In
the end, the man decides to desert his god by no longer responding to conditioned responses. The
setting thus becomes imagery reflecting a symbolic wasteland of place and character.
Thus, the setting is observed barren then the absurd nature of the play will come to the surface.
Absurdity in Structure
Beckett’s writing reflects the absence of hope, the dissatisfaction, and the repetition of the absurd
heroes above the play. “Act Without Words” is structured in a way, which presents the idea of the
futility and meaninglessness of life. The basic structure of the drama where being tired of their
lives and thwarted efforts to escape frustration and torment by offstage power. The continuous
failed trials increase his despair and his life is disgusted in this way and thus absurd. This is this
structure, which shows the absurd nature of the drama. The nameless character wants to commit
suicide to escape the harsh realities of life and to achieve his goals and this is the sign of absurdity.
Absurdity in Theme
As we have been through the structures, titles and settings of both the texts and found elements of
absurdity in them. So the same can be the case with the themes of the texts. The major theme in
both the texts seems to be that of isolation; physical, spiritual and mental isolation.

The overarching theme of Beckett has always been that of the utter absurdity of existence. His
characters, having been thrown into a world having to face the same challenges every single day,
with the illusion of choice provided to them, with no actual choice in their existence, are pure
examples of this. In Act Without Words I, the objects that fell to the character in the play are
symbolic of hope, but they all failed him, denying him of all possible reward. This is the existential
element in Act Without Words I. It is useless to reach for the carafe and climb the branch; it is
futile to escape the stage, his existence itself. Fate will claim him nonetheless, although it decides
when. In the play, the character is seen attempting suicide. However, the bough of the palm tree
dipped down to the ground, denying him of any action that he may freely act out. And it is through
the acknowledgement of this truth that the character stays motionless and gives up, even when the
carafe comes to him in the end.

Beckett confronts humanity’s unceasing struggle with its disturbingly absurd, thrown condition. It
mimes the thwarted attempts of a nameless character, an everyman, hurled onto the stage, the
desert, to obtain a carafe of water, hovering just out of reach. Tools and objects descend to help
his objective, each one removed once he figures out their more beneficial use: suicide. Ultimately,
the failed efforts result in his refusal to participate or respond to the world; the useless passion of
all human endeavors. With faultless philosophical and empirical observation, Act Without Words
places a “dazzling light” on the human condition – its conditioning – bringing forth a
contemporary, mythological piece on the futility and crushing anguish of human activity in an
absurd wasteland, out of our control. Existence is part vain and labor. By that, it simply means—
even if one understands the futility of labor and existence itself, we exist still, by no deniability.
The mime depicts a man flung on to the stage of life, at first obeying the call of a number of
impulses, drawn to the pursuit of illusory objectives by whistles blown from the wings,
protagonists facing a series of frustrations and setbacks but finding peace only when he has learned
the pointlessness of even trying to attain any of these objective, and finally refusing any of the
physical satisfactions dangled before him. He can find peace only through ‘the recognition of the
nothingness which is the only reality’.

Absurdity in Characters
It is the struggle of one man, the everyman, and it is governed by physical, base actions
that are universal. The nameless character of the texts also got elements of absurdity. Therefore,
we can say that it is this meaninglessness, this detachment, this strangeness and finally, this
spiritual and physical isolation in the character that make him absurd character.
Absurdity in Actions/ Silence
In a pantomime, however, there is something more than an “unnatural silence.” It is the performer’s
desire to symbolize rather than explicitly state something. After all, “[e] everyone in the world
uses mime, although it is rarely given the name. When words are difficult to find, when emotion
is great, gestures take over” . If gestures, and not words, are the embodiment of a pantomime
performance, then what we see, and not what we hear, will transport us into the realm of
interpretation. Traditionally, the pantomime performer suggests objects by means of gestures. On
the other hand, Beckett’s performer is helped by real objects, which descend from above. On an
almost bare stage, these items function like cartoon captions. Beckett’s pantomime performer does
not engage in a descriptive monologue with them because he may feel as soundless as them. Once
they descend from above, they stay on stage a couple of minutes, enough to tease, and not release,
the pantomime performer from his painful act of finding his role in this world.

Actions are universal, words are not. Words are meaningless, and practically absurd. Actions carry
greater meaning. Beckett confronts humanity’s unceasing struggle with its disturbingly absurd,
thrown condition. It mimes the thwarted attempts of a nameless character, an everyman, hurled
onto the stage, the desert, to obtain a carafe of water, hovering just out of reach. Tools and objects
descend to help his objective, each one confiscated once he figures out their more beneficial use:
suicide. Ultimately, the failed efforts result in his refusal to participate or respond to the world; the
useless passion of all human endeavors. Beckett’s short piece may appear simplistic, and perhaps
a bit understated, however, every line and its corresponding action requires a significant amount
of “unpacking.” He creates a complex weave of allusions, drawing from numerous sources, from
the Greek myths of Tantalus and Sisyphus to the Judeo-Christian tradition. Beckett was a defining
member in the Theatre of the Absurd, giving an artistic dimension to the attitudes of the French
Existentialists, especially Albert Camus.

We are afraid of the ultimate silence because we are afraid of annihilation. We feel we have been
left in this world without any certainty, except that of our imminent death.

The nameless character, in Beckett’s Act Without Words, is a typical absurd hero
personifying the real quality of an absurd life; he is absurd through his passion and suffering,
through his eternal fate, work that can never be finished. Beckett suggests that Man might even
approach his task with joy. The moments of sorrow or melancholy come when he looks back at
the world he's left behind, or when he hopes or wishes for happiness. When nameless accepts his
fate, however, the sorrow and melancholy of it vanish.

2-Albert Camus’ The Myth of Sisyphus

Albert Camus (1913-1960), a French novelist and essayist, who worked out the theory of
absurdity and who also applied this thesis in his literary writings, deals with the absurd fate of man
and literally demonstrates it with the legendary ancient myth of Sisyphus in his stimulating
analysis The Myth of Sisyphus. Camus goes into the problem what the absurdity is and how it
arises. He also gives the characteristics of human basic ontological categories as the feelings of
"denseness" and "the strangeness of the world" (Sisyphus, 398), which are the feelings of the
Absurdity of man in a world where the decline of religious belief has deprived man of his
certainties.
In the last chapter, Camus outlines the legend of Sisyphus who defied the gods and put
Death in chains so that no human needed to die. When Death was eventually liberated and it came
time for Sisyphus himself to die, he concocted a deceit which let him escape from the underworld.
Finally captured, the gods decided on his punishment: for all eternity, he would have to push a
rock up a mountain; on the top, the rock rolls down again and Sisyphus has to start over. Camus
sees Sisyphus as the absurd hero who lives life to the fullest, hates death and is condemned to a
meaningless task.
Camus is not told how Sisyphus endures his punishment in the underworld: that much is
left to our imagination. What fascinates Camus is Sisyphus's state of mind in that moment after
the rock rolls away from him at the top of the mountain. As he heads down the mountain, briefly
free from his labor, he is conscious, aware of the absurdity of his fate. His fate can only be
considered tragic because he understands it and has no hope for reprieve. At the same time, the
lucidity he achieves with this understanding also places him above his fate.
Camus suggests that Sisyphus might even approach his task with joy. The moments of
sorrow or melancholy come when he looks back at the world he's left behind, or when he hopes or
wishes for happiness. When Sisyphus accepts his fate, however, the sorrow and melancholy of it
vanish. Camus suggests that acknowledging "crushing truths" like the eternity and futility of his
fate is enough to reduce them less crushing. He refers to Oedipus, who, having suffered so much,
is able to "conclude that all is well."
Camus has argued that the absurd hero sees life as a constant struggle, without hope. Any
attempt to deny or avoid the struggle and the hopelessness that define our lives is an attempt to
escape from this absurd contradiction. Camus's single requirement for the absurd man is that he
lives with full awareness of the absurdity of his position. While Sisyphus is pushing his rock up
the mountain, there is nothing for him but toil and struggle. Yet in those moments where Sisyphus
descends the mountain free from his burden, he is aware. He knows that he will struggle forever
and he knows that this struggle will get him nowhere. This awareness is precisely the same
awareness that an absurd man has in this life. So long as Sisyphus is aware, his fate is no different
and no worse than our lot in life.
He reacts to Sisyphus's fate with horror because he sees its futility and hopelessness. Of
course, the central argument of this essay is that life itself is a futile struggle devoid of hope.
However, Camus also suggests that this fate is only horrible if human continue to hope, if they
think that there is something more that is worth aiming for. Our fate only seems horrible when
they place it in contrast with something that would seem preferable. If they accept that there is no
preferable alternative, then we can accept our fate without horror. Only then, Camus suggests, can
they fully appreciate life, because hey are accepting it without reservations. Therefore, Sisyphus
is above his fate precisely because he has accepted it. His punishment is only horrible if he can
hope or dream for something better. If he does not hope, the gods have nothing to punish him with.
Camus suggests that, happiness and the absurd are closlylinked.They are both connected
to the discovery that humans’ world and fate is their own, that there is no hope and that our life is
purely what they make of it. As he descends the mountain, Sisyphus is totally aware of his fate.
Camus concludes: "One must imagine Sisyphus happy." (Sisyphus, 401). It means that, happiness
and absurd awareness are intimately connected. Human can only be truly happy, he suggests, when
they accept their life and fate as entirely their own—as the only thing they have and as the only
thing they will ever be. The final sentence reads: "One must imagine Sisyphus happy." But why
must we imagine Sisyphus happy? Camus's wording suggests that human have no choice in the
matter. But is there an alternative? Sisyphus is the absurd hero, the man who loved life so much
that he has been condemned to an eternity of futile and hopeless labor. And yet he is above that
fate precisely because he is aware of it. If Sisyphus is not happy in this awareness, then absurd
awareness does not bring happiness. It would then follow that happiness is only possible if we
evade absurd awareness, if we leap into hope or faith.
If the leap into hope or faith represents an attempt to escape from the reality of our fate,
and if happiness is only possible through such a leap, then happiness would essentially be an
escape. Life itself would be inherently unhappy and happiness would be a sham born out of denial.
We must imagine Sisyphus happy if we want to believe in genuine happiness. Though this is the
last sentence of the essay, we might see it as the initial premise that starts Camus's reasoning.
Because Camus essentially believes in the idea that individual human experience is the only thing
that is real, if he wants to show that happiness is real he must show that individual humans can
truly be happy based on their experiences, not on their denial of experience. If happiness is real,
we must be able to find happiness without relying on hope, faith, or anything else that goes beyond
immediate experience. The Myth of Sisyphus is essentially an elaborate attempt to show that this
is possible, and it concludes with its starting premise: if genuine happiness is possible, then
Sisyphus must be happy.
Camus' Sisyphus is a typical absurd hero personifying the real quality of an absurd life; he
is absurd through his passion and suffering, through his eternal fate, work that can never be
finished: "The Gods had condemned Sisyphus to ceaselessly rolling a rock to the top of a mountain,
whence the stone would fall back of its own weight. They had thought with some reason that there
is no more dreadful punishment than futile and hopeless labor." (Sisyphus, 396). We see the great
effort in him, recurring again and again; he tries to move the boulder and push it up the hill
thousands of times. Finally, at the end of his long, exhausting effort, he reaches his aim. However,
at the same moment, he sees the boulder rolling down back to the lower world from where it will
have to be lifted again. And so he returns back to the bottom. "It is during that return that pause,
that Sisyphus interests me. A face that toils so close to stones is already stone itself! I see that man
going back down with a heavy yet measured step toward the torment of which he will never know
the end. That hour [...] is the hour of consciousness." (Sisyphus, 395). These moments of
consciousness open up the world of the absurdity, the world of never-ending effort to go on, the
world from which it is impossible to escape, the world of estrangement, loneliness, waiting, and
continual endurance.

3-Schopenhauerian Will in An Act Without Words

(Desire and the Absurd)

Samuel Beckett’s An Act Without Words points out the absurdity of human life
presented as an endless series of attempts to satisfy the Schopenhauerian will. The human ego is
forced into consciousness to act out desires that can never be satisfied and find meaning in a
meaningless world. Even the moments of peace are fleeting as the ego’s duties to the will always
disturb the bliss of silence. Schopenhauer’s idea that the ego can transcend the will proves false
for the mime. Physical reality constantly prevents the ego from fully satisfying all its desires. An
Act Without Words presents a Schopenhauerian situation, the mental functions embodied as a
variety of shapes and objects and comically enacted events.

Arthur Schopenhauer defined the will as the pervading dynamic force controlling human
life. The will, antecedent to Freud’s libido, impels (drives/ urges) everything, including the human
machine that can perceive and report its representations and their acts. The will is the inner nature
of each experiencing being and assumes, in time and space, the appearance of a body, which is an
idea. The intellect, ego, is the agent of the will and capable of conscious action in the external
world of objects; the ego obtains food, drink, sex, comfort, and experiences to fulfill the desires of
the will. A fully satisfied desire would result in a mental equilibrium (stability /balance) without
the need for physical action. For Schopenhauer, the tragedy of life arises from the nature of the
will, constantly urging the individual towards the satisfaction of successive goals, none of which
can provide permanent satisfaction for the infinite activity of the life force, or will. The ego can
bring the activity of the will to an end through an attitude of resignation. In An Act Without Words,
the protagonist is the embodied ego, trying to satisfy the will’s demands, yet never achieving any
satisfaction.

The protagonist in An Act Without Words represents the ego. The ego exists in a body
endowed (gifted)with consciousness. Similarly, Beckett’s protagonist is a human being thrown
into a desert containing “dazzling light” (125), emblematic(representative) of his consciousness of
himself and the world. The ego’s illumination(radiance) gives external objects form in the mind’s
representations, knowledge of which the will desires. Beckett uses cubes and objects in simple
shapes to demonstrate(determine) the ego as perceiving(observing) the external world as units that
are graspable in mind’s eye. The will seeks knowledge of the external world through the ego, via
direct experience. Beckett uses a mime as his protagonist to emphasize the ego as a physical actor
of the will’s desire. Words, created to categorize experience, are not useful in allowing the will
adequate knowledge of reality. The mime is the puppet of the will and continually
demonstrates(reveals/shows) the ego’s incapacity to fulfill its desires through imposing order upon
the chaos of the will and external world. The ego is, itself, the agent of disharmony between one’s
internal will and the will of the external world.

The will drives the ego to discover the hidden meanings of the universe in order to achieve
a harmonious state of complete self-awareness. The ego experiences the mysteries of existence in
a seemingly irrational phenomenological world. The protagonist makes a valiant(heroic) effort to
deny(reject) impotence(helplessness) (after every fall, the mime immediately stands back up) and
tries achieving the will’s desire for knowledge through action. Whistles from the left and right
and a rope descended from above attract his attention, tempting him with the mystery of their
source. Playing the role of the ego, the mime acts upon the will’s desire for discovery, but he is
“[i]immediately flung back” towards his original state of ignorance. Although the will seeks
discovery and knowledge, the ego is a limited being unable to experience, fully, life’s
phenomenon. The hidden meanings of the world easily elude(escape) the searching ego.

Since direct conscious awareness of the external world is impossible, the ego uses reason
and logic to make the universe knowable. The ego imposes order upon the minimal awareness it
maintains of the external world to create a predictable world so that it can quickly meet any
demands from the will. Beckett’s protagonist tries ordering the various cubes and the rope
provided to him by the external world so that he can obtain the object of desire, the water. He uses
reason in trying to determine the proper construction for his makeshift ladder (demonstrating
humanity’s need to create the empirical sciences, based upon easily comprehendible units, such as
cubes) and deciding to fashion a lasso from rope to capture the desirable object. However, all
attempts at order prove futile as the carafe is pulled out of reach and the cubes disappear. The
irrational will of the external world does not cooperate with the ego’s attempt at structure. As time
moves on, the ego’s constructs decay and disappear, as the external world changes from the forms
the ego once knew. The harmony of an ordered and predictable universe is a dream, time is
irrational, and the external world too chaotic for the mere ego to grasp.

What does not elude the ego is an array of objects in the world which offer immediate, but

transient, gratification for the will. By eating, drinking, resting, scratching, and so on the ego

gratifies its bodily will and can explore other, more internal mysteries. The protagonist is given

the possibility of immediate physical comfort, represented by the tree casting a comfortable shade

and a “tiny carafe, to which is attached a huge label inscribed WATER”(126). The protagonist

rests beneath the tree, thus satisfying his will’s desire for physical comfort. During this repose,

the ego looks “at his hands.” He is reflecting upon himself. Only through introspection

(contemplation) can one discover his prime motivating factor as the will, which is the same will

as that of the external world. Yet, the external physical world does not allow extended periods for

the ego to reflect because time passes, the objects offering comfort fade (“the palms close like a

parasol”), and new desirable objects (the water) appear. The ego’s inability to silence the will

undercuts(weakens) any chance for harmony. The physical world, existing in time, offers objects

that can only shortly quiet the will, but is hostile to the ego, preventing any knowledge of both the

external and internal worlds

The ego, unable to satisfy its will through external exploration, the creation of order, and
internal discovery turns to death as the only option left that seems capable of quieting the will’s
demands and allowing a static existence. The protagonist, after failing at all attempts for
knowledge and satisfaction, contemplates suicide. He tries tying the rope onto the bough of the
tree, but, again, the physical world undercuts his wishes as the “bough folds down against
trunk”(130). He “opens his collar, frees his neck”(132) in order to commit suicide with the
scissors, but they, like the cubes and carafe, are taken away. The will does not allow the ego to
escape its duties in life. The internal will desires experience and the external will desires to be
experience. The ego cannot choose to established its own time of death; only the irrational will
guides the world’s and people’s actions.

The ego, held by the will that created it, cannot escape its constant craving for knowledge
of the external and internal worlds. It is also incapable of ever discovering the harmony and unity
of the internal and external wills. Schopenhauer points out that the only way to peace is through a
will-less contemplation of the nothingness behind the veil of representations. In a sense, the
personal ego dies as its own internal will identifies with and finds reflection in the external
dynamics of spontaneous phenomenon. Through transcending one’s ego, one realizes that the
irrational personal will and irrational external will are one. Attempting an ego-death, the
protagonist “remains lying on his side”(132) and does not respond to the objects and whistles
which had previously sparked his desire:

…with the free denial, the surrender, of the will, all those phenomena also are now
abolished…No will: no representation, no world.[1]

The protagonist acts out the desire to transcend his ego, the will, and the world, preferring the
peace of knowing and being nothing. The protagonist is still visible onstage as the act ends with
him looking at his hands. Staring at his hands, he demonstrates that he is still self-aware, but not
bothered by the will’s demands. The image of him staring at his own hands is circular, emblematic
of the unity of the universal will. The image also is a zero, nothing, which is the ultimate reality
behind phenomena. The ego has transcended his tragic situation.

In Samuel Beckett’s An Act Without Words, a man thrust onto a brightly lit and barren
stage is tantalized by a number of whistles and objects, and fails in his attempts to fulfill his desires
for meaning, order, and bodily satisfaction, and death. He eventually realizes the futility of trying
to satisfy desire and tries resigning himself to an inactive and peaceful acceptance of nothingness.
His life is comically absurd because he can neither satisfy his will nor escape it. The external
world, chaotically transforming through time, counters the capacity for the ego to fulfill its desires,
even the desire to cease desiring, dissolving the chance for a conclusive harmony unless the ego
dismiss its own will. The protagonist in Beckett’s play cannot achieve any harmony between
internal and external phenomena, until entering the phase of Schopenhauerian resignation, where
the intellect/ego detaches itself from willing, recognizes the universal will, and sees behind the
veil of ideas into Nothing. In not moving at the end of the play, the mime demonstrates he has
achieved a point of harmonious peace by surrendering the will and wanting to know nothing.

4- The Ply as a Tragi-comedy

Beckett is renowned for his tragi-comedies. His most famous play that brought him to lime
light was sub- titled as a tragic-comedy in two acts and other plays like Endgame, Happy Days,
Krapp's Last Tape that have been already discussed in this research work are exuberant with
tragedy of human life intermingled with the comic antics of the characters. Act Without Words I
and // that form a part of his later works for theatre and are lesser known than the plays mentioned
above also feature this great artistry of comedy and cataclysm beautifully amalgamated by the
master of humour or better said dark humor. The insertion of comic is what makes his characters
so human in our eyes. Despite surviving in an environment that is completely in opposition to them
they persist and meanwhile perform on stage stupid routines as the carrot and radish routine in
Waiting for Godot, and eating bananas in Krapp's Last Tape. Although moronic, they bring tears
that are mixture of joy and sadness that sums up the true to life image of these characters.
Kimball King asserts "Beckettian characters are kept in trash cans, or stuck in pilesof sand, or left
forgotten and stranded. Despite these bleak scenarios these plays are comic because the spirit of
optimism reigns, not in a falsely cheery way, but with the characters' wry resignation that one has
no choice but to endure."'*'^ The true nature of existence as seen in the writings of Beckett is made
very obvious in the opening directions of Act Without Words I when the mime is forced to stage
which is equivalent to the world as a desert land. The mime is forced to strive, to suffer needless
of his desire to live or to end his life. Desert. Dazzling light. The man is flung backwards on the
stage from the right \Ning. He falls, gets up immediately, dusts himself, turns aside, reflects.
Whistle from the right wing. He reflects, goes out right. immediately flung back on stage he falls,
gets up immediately, dusts himself, turns aside, reflects. Whistle from the left wing. He reflects,
goes towards the left wing, hesitates, thinks better of it, halts, turns aside, reflects.'

The pathos is clear as life is to be endured without any choice. The mime has no exit from
the stage, he is there to bear the consequences of the fact that he exists and existence needs a price
to be paid for, and that is the endless, ruthless whiling away of time and meanwhile watching and
listening vulnerably for the whistle of the unknown entity as in Act Without Words I. Along with
pathos in the opening scene there is comedy too as the mime keeps on falling as he tries to leave
the stage. Falling of a clown again and again has given pleasure to spectators since the beginning
of this art named comedy, be it in circus or in a play being staged. It is truly tragicomic in nature
as the mime is shown to be nothing but puppets acting and moving as directed by the suppressive
invisible forces that rule them. It is true carrier of the tragic philosophy of Beckett. In Act Without
Words I the single mime is provided with many props like a pair of scissors that the mime uses to
trim his nails. It is comical since maybe in such a world of hopelessness as his one may have
thought of cutting off his head instead of nails. Rosette highlights the comicality of the scene "The
next one, once again announced by the same imperious, monotonously shrill whistle, is a pair of
scissors. The man sitting comfortably in the lacy shade of his tree, proceeds to trim his nails. There
is something pathetic and comical at once about this intimate act of personal grooming, one
performed for no other reason than the sudden availability of the correct object, Beckett himself
averted the same idea in the following of the pantomime: A pair of tailor's scissors descend from
flies, comes to rest before tree, a yard from ground. He continues to look at his hands. Whistle
from above. He looks up, sees scissors, takes them and starts to trim his nails."^

There is another funny moment in the play when the mime in order to reach the carafe puts
a big cube upon the smaller one and stumbles down. Though it may seem funny, it can be tragic
too as humanity in its attempts to reach the goal set by them keep on falling on the way as nothing
in this world comes so easily. Here Beckett seems to tell us that the invisible forces deny us
everything, we are onlookers for whom all hopes are crushed by the tyrant who keeps laughing in
our face. He turns, sees second cube, look at it, at carafe, reflects, goes to cube, takes it up, carries
it over and sets it down under carafe, tests its stability, gets up on it, tries in vain to reach carafe,
renounces, gets down, takes up second cube back to its place, hesitates, thinks better of it, sets it
down, goes to big cube, takes it up, carries it over and puts it on all one, tests their stability, gets
up on them, the cubes collapse, he falls, gets up immediately, brushes himself, reflects" The most
moving thing about the mimes is that through his silence he becomes the voice of the playwright.
The silence that exists on the stage speaks a lot about the human life and its toils. The use of
language itself makes the characters of his play conscious of their existence which is a painful fact
to be accepted as such silence is a more powerful way of expressing the pain: The psychic
predicaments and existential fears that Beckett's characters experience explain not only the
deviation from the referential and syntactic properties of language, but also their constant need and
search for some sort of expressive medium that is capable of releasing them from the overbearing
bounds of time. Language unfortunately does not offer them this possibility. [ . . .]. Silence is
therefore the only medium left for them to transcend time, to communicate the incommunicable
and to better inform the audience about their indecisiveness, uncertainty, confusion, and fear.^^
Hence it is clear that silence brings out the malady of these troubled souls much better than they
could be given assertion in words. Beckett finds silence appropriate, both to puncture his
hero’s/heroines' words and to draw the reader/spectator's attention to the psychic and existential
troubles they experience. “The pathos existing in the play come to surface when we question
ourselves as to why Beckett chose mime as the medium for Act Without Words I and // and as
Khaled opines "In classical drama, stage music needed silence to be heard and felt; but in Beckett's
drama, silence itself becomes a kind of music, a kind of melody that issues from the depth of
human suffering and originates in the most painful states of anxiety, alienation, and fear."^^
the mime is abundant in the aspect of weary and sick feeling of the physical subsistence
and being a part of the cosmos. It is about the relationship between people and the relation they
share with the most omnipotent creator and the deterioration they go through while trying to
balance them and in the course of time are lost in deep dark furrow of utmost agony. In Gottfried
Buttner's opinion Act Without Words I and Act Without Words U both are such later works of
Beckett that through these relationships he brings to light the tenebrous condition of a common
man's common reality: Act without words I is a kind of parody of the relation human beings have
to the 'upper', or spiritual, world, the nameless character is in his extreme behavior rather absurd.
If there is next to no hope of reaching 'salvation' in Act I, suggests that there is never the less a life
to be lived, tragicomic and absurd as it may be further points out this wonderful insight of Samuel
Beckett while concentrating on the futility of life as seen in his works "Contemplating the so called
nothingness or naught, he could grasp new insights into the human condition, hidden deeply within
us."^^ As it is well known about Beckett the agonies of characters have no end. As in the play
Waiting for Godot the mime in the play Act Without Words I tries to commit suicide at the end of
the pantomime like Estragon but all the tools that he needs to end his life are snatched away from
him and he is left helpless with nothing to do but to keep on surviving:

He goes to tree, at bough, turns and looks at cubes, looks again at bough, drops lasso, goes
to cubes, takes up small one, carries it over and sets it under bough, goes back for big one,
takes it up and carries it under bough, makes to put it on big one, tests their stability, turns
aside and stoops to pick up lasso. The bough folds down against the trunk. He straightens
up with lasso in his hand, turns and sees what has happened. He drops lasso, turns aside,
reflects,

Suicide is denied and the mime is left at the end just looking at his empty hands. His empty
hands may suggest or it would not be wrong to affirm they mock him about his ineffectual drill,
but we as human have to find a reason even in this unreasonable and aimless life as this is what
makes us supreme. As Rosette Lamont remarks: Act Without Words I, despite the unsuccessful
suicide attempt near the end, dramatizes the human effort to survive in a hostile environment and
the desire to understand the environment. There is no control over the process, no understanding
of It. The insignificant creatures presented on the stage is not purged by their suffering; yet, by
witnessing their Sufferings, so much like our own in its absurdity, we do undergo a classical
catharsis, a catharsis through laughter and terror, pity and hopelessness."

Beckett invites us to a world where comic turns out to be the real tragedy of life and pathos
in their utmost intensity show common man as a clown running around to hold on the rope of faith
that has long ago ceased to exist in the modern world as Clark expresses "No one has been able,
more comically or horribly, to dig down into man's intellectual grotto. Perhaps Beckett takes us as
far underground as we can bear to go."^^ His view about him is absolutely true as with Beckett we
keep entering new arenas of comedy and tragedy. In Beckett's world both comedy and tragedy
bring tears to the eyes, tragedy as its true nature invokes the most supreme emotions that flow out
in form of tears whereas comedy implores another towering feeling that is happiness but in
Beckett's plays it brings tears accompanied by laughter when we watch his tramps, the broken
fragments of humanity walking along with their sweetness in everyday slapstick routines. Rosette
states "Beckett's wordless plays are the perfect vehicle for their author's ironic sense of humor.
The question most often asked is, "Are they really funny? Does one laugh? What kind of laughter
is elicited?" There is no simple answer since Beckett's laugh, or that of his clown-heroes, is a
grimace somewhere between soundless merriment and mute sobbing."^^

Honestly, his plays are somewhere in between mirth and tears, they are neither complete
tragedies nor comedies. They are alluring anecdote of human foibles. Just like his earlier plays Act
Without Words I and 11 echo the emptiness that surrounds us. Pantomime in the hands of Samuel
Beckett attained a different colouring. The mimes in the process of acting out a story evoke
sympathy but the resilience the mime has against the invisible forces establishes the fact that he is
going to survive the hostility of the environment. Beckett's mimes deliver the message that life is
to be lived, the choice is ours to live it as an active participant in the hustle bustle of life like mime
B or to live but endure with a sadistic approach the droning rituals and withering away in the
process like mime A. Beckett is known much as an author who gives words to the tragedy of
human life, his works are considered pessimistic and too remote from any ray of hope, they till
date open new gates to explore the darker side of human psyche.

People in the world of Beckett's drama laugh and cry together. Amid between all the
insurgencies and insecurities, they find time to laugh. The laughter may not be the one that relieve
the soul from the burden of despondency, but its existence is duel acknowledged in all the plays.
Comedy is to be found in the plays through vaudeville routines and verbal exchanges between the
characters. In Act Without Words I, is hilarious enough to tickle the bones. All these aspects make
them real tragic figures. Beckett borrowed all these antics from the circus clowns. Beckett's fond
association with the famous comic actors has been discussed at length in the course of the thesis.
The protagonists of his plays always bear resemblance with clowns. Beckett's comedy Keeping
in view the object of this research work a sincere attempt is made to point out the comic-pathetic
aspects in the major plays of Samuel Beckett. His plays are amalgamation of tragedy and comedy.
In Beckett's hands tragedy gave way to comedy, and comedy under it's mask of boisterous laughter
hides inescapable miseries pungent with dull meaningless strivings and toils of everyday life.
5- Religious Allusion (Jesus) in Act Without Words I

Uchman in her book The Problem of Time in the Plays of Samuel Beckett says that

“Beckett’s "heroes", even though always lonely, are hardly ever alone” (4). The man who is flung

into desert is the only character played by an actor in Act Without Words I. Solitude of the character

of this one-mime play is constantly disturbed by a whistle. Per Nykrog in his essay “In the Ruins

of the Past: Reading Beckett Intertextually” views the man in Act Without Words I as somebody

“who is shown trying to communicate with an almighty off-stage manipulator. And this almighty

stage manager is not to be trusted (…). The "universe" represented in Act Without Words (…) is

dominated by (…) an "evil spirit"” (139).

The whistle, which is identified here as the evil, draws man’s attention to various objects

that descend from flies and thus encourages the man to use them. The man obeys the sound of the

whistle and uses the shadow of a tree, pair of scissors, cubes and rope. All these objects have been

provided to give the man a delusion of taking possession of a carafe with water. The man, however,

does not succed in seizing the carafe. If the whistle did not draw man’s attention to the objects and

later to the water, he may not have noticed them at all and thus not being disapponted for not being

successful in reaching them. The whistle takes advantage of the manʼs situation – he is in the desert

on his own, probably hungry and thirsty because of the “dazzling light” (Beckett Act Without

Words I 203). The whistle thus provides him with a lie and in the end the man refuses to obey it

any longer and instead of following its hints when he hears “Whistle from above. He does not

move” (206). As soon as the man abandond the whistle’s guidance the rest of the objects, which

were placed in the dessert to tempt the man and later to lead him to suicide, are taken away. The

last act of the mime is when the man “looks at his hands” (206). Looking at his hands can be
interpreted as a preparation for prayer and hence the interpretation viewing some allusions to Jesus

tempted in the desert is to be described.

Depending on the translation, “Jesus was led up by the Spirit into the wilderness to be

tempted by the devil” (New International Reader’s Version Mark 1.12) or “the Spirit sent him out

into the wilderness and he was in the wilderness forty days,being tempted by Satan” (The Holy

Bible: New International Version Mark 1.12 - 13), a similarity of environment can be seen between

the preseted situation of Jesus and the situation of man from Act Without Words I.

Another similarity can be deduced from their physical condition. Jesus spent forty days in the

desert and “After fasting forty days and forty nights, he was hungry. The tempter came to him

(…)” (NIV Matt. 4.2 - 3). The tempter, in this case the devil, comes to Jesus when he is physically

deprived and the same takes place with the man in Beckett’s mime because the whistle starts to

draw his attention to several objects when he is thirsty and thus also physically deprived. However,

the method Jesus and the man from Act Without Words I use to deal with their tempter differs. The

man from the short mime obeys the whistle even if it leads him to disappointment. He gives up his

subordination only when he has tried everything that could provide him with demanded water and

nothing seemed to be efficient. His approach is thus rather passive in contrast to Jesus, who is

active in his struggle with Satan by replying to his questions and so the evil is refused resolutely.

Satan tries to tempt Jesus attacking his hunger, a sensitive spot, but Jesus puts him to silence by

stating: “It is written: ‘Man shall not live on bread alone, but on every word that comes from the

mouth of God’ ” (Matt. 4.4). The outcome of bot his, however, identical again: the man in Act

Without Words I does not respond to the whistle and the last object the whistle has drawn attention

to disappears and the whistle itself becomes silent, and Jesus makes his tempter go away by
actively saying: “Away from me, Satan! For it is written: ‘Worship the Lord your God, and serve

him only’ ” (Matt. 4.10).

6-BECKETT’S REFERENCE TO GREEK MYTHOLOGY:

Beckett's main character finds himself, on a stage and is whistled at to complete tasks which
may help him grab hold of a carafe of water but never allowed to grab hold of the carafe. This
frustrating scene is a silent depiction of futility which we can find in Greek mythology for further
parallel. Tantalus, a Greek mythological figure is in the same way made to be in this unending
situation, very much like the character in Beckett’s Act Without Words.

Tantalus according to Greek mythology is made to stand in a pool of water with a low
hanging branch of fruit ever eluding(fleeing/ escaping) from him when he reach for them.
Whenever he thirsts for water, the water would always recede(withraw) before he could take a
drink. This punishment was eternally imposed to him by the gods for his gluttonous(greedy)
misdeeds, both to his fellow mortals and to the gods themselves. Tantalus had stolen ambrosia, a
food for the gods which grants the consumer immortality, and had spilled the secrets of the gods
to the mortals back home. An even more gruesome misdeed was his act of offering his own son,
Pelops, as food for the gods. This evil could not be left unpunished by the gods and so condemn
Tantalus to a state of eternal futility( pointlessness). The state of Tantalus is in a way the state of
Beckett’s character. For the most part, this has been the case for a majority of Beckett’s character.
Beckett’s characters are almost all the time, somewhat stuck in a confinement or a world so small
and desolate. The tragedy of Tantalus represents the first of the two plays under mime play, Act
Without Words.

Another reference to Greek mythology is that of Sisyphus for the second play in Act
Without Words. Sisyphus, according to legend, cheated death, not one but twice. His wits single
handedly cuffed( stricken) Death and bind him in his house. When Zeus sent Thanatos— Death—
after Sisyphus, Sisyphus managed to outwit( beat) Death. Due to Death’s imprisonment, no mortal
on earth could die- the mortally wounded, the headless, boneless and the disease-torn. Until finally,
the god of war, Ares set Thanatos free, and delivered Sisyphus to him. In his descend to the
Underworld, and for the second time, the cunning Sisyphus cheated Hades and his wife Persephone
in escaping death altogether by breaking his three day contract with them, until he was claimed by
fate later in life. Through this classical mythology, Beckett discovered a symbol for the futility,
frustration and absurdity of all man's everyday labors. Sisyphus suffered eternal punishment,
having to perpetually (everlastingly) roll a great stone to the top of a hill, only to see it roll back
down again. Being born to enact and endure an eternal cycle of arousal-activity-rest, without any
meaningful progress being achieved is the accent of the speechless play.

7-Tantalos in Act Without Words I

Between Tantalos and the character from Act Without Words I exists a “rather obvious

allegory: Tantalos punished, the offence uncertain” (Gontarski).

“Tantalos was feeling happy” (Parandowski 146). To commence a description of a person’s life

story (in Tantalos’ case of a fictional person) by describing his mood as “happy” and to finish this

story with uncompromising condemnation in Tartaros emphasizes the difference between the

beginning and the end of the story. To make the difference more evident and provocative, Tartaros

is described by Rose in his Handbook of Greek Mythology as “the place of punishment of the

wicked” (80) and is situated “opposed to Elysion or the Islands of the Blessed” (80).

Tantalos was a man who enjoyed friendship with the Olympians and was often invited by them to

their table. In Mythology Parandowski states that in the beginning “he behaved bashfully” (146)

but later gained self-confidence and began to steel their nectar. Tantalos’ sin, the reason why he

was brought down to Tartaros was a murder. Tantalos killed his son Pelops and since then is his

family accursed. Gontarski uses the term “the patriarch of the troubled house of Atreus”
(Gontarski) but in the manner as Rose puts it the notion of hereditary sin becomes more obvious

as “family had been acursed ever since the days of their ancestor Tantalos” (247).

However clear the reason for Tantalos’s punishment in Tartaros may appear, the truth is that his

sin is variously reported and thus not known exactly1.

If to compare Act Without Words I with the Greek myth about Tantalos, what they share is the

uncertain or unknown offence commited by the characters (with the assumption that the Beckettian

character commited a sin).

The way they are punished is extraordinarily similar.

Tantalos (…) is everlastingly hungry and thirsty. He stands in a pool of water which

plashes against his chin, but always vanishes when he tries to drink it; overhead

hang all manner of fruit-trees, which are always tossed out of his reach by a wind

when he tries to gather their fruit (Rose 81).

The man in Act Without Words I is provided with means to satisfy his thirst in the desert, however,

the water is beyond his reach. There is also a tree which can provide him with a shelter against the

“dazzling light” (Beckett Act Without Words I 203) but “the palms close like a parasol, the shadow

disappears” (203). How long their punishment lasts is unknown. According to Rose Tantalos is

“everlastingly hungry and thirsty” (81), as to the man from Act Without Words I it is not clear.

According to what Esslin says about the works of the Theatre of the Absurd, that they “often have

neither a beginning nor an end” (The Theatre 22) and thus the duration of the man’s suffering is

unknown.

8- Heidegger in Act Without Words I

1
Jadwiga Uchman in her book The Problem of Time in the Plays of Samuel Beckett views

Beckett’s theatre as “an extraordinary and paradoxical Dasein” (3). Dasein is a German word

meaning "being here" (da – here, sein – to be) which can be translated as being or existence. Dasein

constitutes a fundamental concept in philosophy of Martin Heidegger. Michael Wheeler in his

encyclopaedia entry on Martin Heidegger explains that as Dasein one ineluctably finds himself in

a world that matters to him in some way or another (The Stanford Encyclopedia of Philosophy).

The word “matter” can be considered a key word in Beckett’s attitude towards people for if his

theatre is an example of Dasein, the world that matters to Beckett and which he finds himself in is

the world of distress. Uchman writes that “Beckett is preoccupied with life as constant suffering

and distress” (The Problem of Time 5) and that people are in the centre of his attention is not

evident only from the fact that during his life Beckett was a generous philantropist but also from

an outrage caused by saying that Beckett was indifferent to people. The situation is described by

Lawrence Held, a former actor with the San Quentin Drama Workshop, when being discussing

Waiting for Godot with Beckett and Rick Cluchey in a parisian hotel,

Sam begins recounting a story told to him by a friend. The punchline of the story

relates to an American academic saying of Beckett, ʻHe doesn’t give a fuck about

people. He’s an artist.ʼ At this point Beckett raise his voice above the clatter of

afternoon tea and shouted. ʻBut I do give a fuck about people! I do give a fuck!ʼ ”

(qtd. in Knowlson 206).

Existence, being in the world or Dasein of the man in Act Without Words I is in a form of

what Heidegger calls Geworfenheit. This phenomenon is translated as thrownness and is explained

as “a having-been-thrown into the world” (Wheeler). This is deduced on the basis of the man being

“flung backwards on stage” (Beckett Act Without Words I 203). This thrownness onto the stage
can be viewed as a resemblance with being born as nobody is asked whether he or she wants to be

delivered into the world. This would support Uchman’s theory of interpreting Act Without Words

I as the metaphoric statement about human life – the beginning standing for the birth, the middle

for man’s life, and the end should logically stand for death, however, the end does not bring a

solution to this question (The Problem of Time 59). The man being flung on the stage seen as the

birth evokes certain extent of cruelty and power as the external power or doer pushing the man

onto the stage is evidently stronger. The part standing to represent human’s life is full of

disappointment, repetition leading to another failures and thus describes the man’s distress – the

notion Beckett is preoccupied with (5).

Another Heideggerian term which can be applied in the interpretation of Act Without Words

I is Stimmung, or mood. According to Heidegger, a man is always in some mood. If the man is

depressed, the world opens up to him as a gloomy and sombre place. The man is able to shift

himself out of this mood, but only to enter a different one that will open the world to him in a

different way (Wheeler). Stimmung of the man in the mime can be seen as a depression for he has

treid to commit a suicide. Thus he views the world as a hostile and unsuitable place to live as he

finds himself in the desert without any supplies of food or a shelter which would help him to

survive in the world. He experiences constant failures in his attempts to gain something which

would help him to survive and thus his vision of the world is not an optimistic one. Shift of

Stimmung is inconceivable for him as there is nothing to shift into. Dasein faces every concrete

situation in which it finds itself, or into which it has been thrown, as a range of possibilities for

acting (Wheeler). The man indeed tries to cope with his situation in the desert, however, every

possibility for acting is thwarted by his inability to be stronger than the external power and

therefore he gives up. Rosangela Barone in her essay “On the Route of a Walking Shadow: Samuel
Beckett’s Come and Go” claims that Act Without Words I, along with some other Beckett’s plays,

is capable of being interpreted either as a verb or as a noun (262) adn thus the man’s acting in

silence without uttering a word can be seen as facing the range of possibilities for acting which

has been provided for him in the desert.

The tradition of the character of the Theatre of the Absurd goes back to the ancient mime called

mimus when the “clown appears as stupidus” (330). Middle Ages clowns and court jesters as the

descendants of ancient mimes kept the tradition alive in mystery plays and farces of medieval

literature. Continuing in the Renaissance, Shakespeare’s plays are full of clowns and comic

characters, too. Notable in Shakespeare is also his “very strong sense of the futility and absurdity

of human condition” (333). His vulgar and spontaneous elements in the theatre continue in the

tradition of Italian commedia dell’arte. Italian authors “meet the same very human demand for

fooling” (333) and “many of the traditional (…) verbal and non-verbal gags of the commedia

dell’arte bear a close resemblance to those of the mimus” (333). Commedia dell’arte influenced

English harlequinades, which kept the tradition until the nineteenth century, and this later

transformed into the tradition of the English music hall and American vaudeville. The silent film

comedy of Charlie Chaplin, Buster Keaton and others derived from the vaudeville and music halls

and according to Esslin it “will in all probability be regarded as (…) the only great achievement in

popular art” (The Theatre 335) in the twentieth century.

9 CHOICE: The very illusion of choice is what blinds the character in the first play, to try and

reach for the carafe of water in a series of futility. This is a means for conveying the helpless

situation of all humanity, with the character being a representative of the powerless state of

existence. What Beckett applies in this subject is that man is manipulated to think he has a freedom

of choice, when in reality he has to conform to the pre-planned system, or circle of coincidental
existence in this ever expanding cosmos. The message is clear: when given the opportunity to get

something that really matters, the matter of choice is false. In existential terms, a refusal to choose

could also mean an exercise of choice; here, the character’s refusal to act is in itself an act of free

will.

10-A SUPERIOR ENTITY: Call it God, creator, the All, the One or just nature; there in the two
plays is something that possesses this characteristic. They could be the same, or they could be
entirely different. It does very much set its foot into the realm of religion and beliefs. Beckett has
a way with representing these figures in many of his plays. Although he did not share anything of
this subject, it is clear that it represents something resembling a force, superior to man himself.
And man has a name for such a superior force.

We know of another presence on the stage due to the whistle. And this whistle governs
over the following actions of the character. It showed him when and where the objects are, and
provided false hope to the man. At one point, it would seem this unidentified force is giving the
man a helping hand, even giving him water, but we soon find out all it has given him was a rope
for his suicide, which, it again later denies the man.

11-Staging Consciousness

As Act Without Words I’s player detaches himself from his biological needs and ceases
his “clowning”, a new emphasis is placed on his psychological needs and impulses, and these are
illustrated through a dynamically-charged, pensive(thoutful) reduction of movement. As Ruby
Cohn states, over the course of the one act drama that she describes as Beckett’s version of the
myth of Tantalus: “The mime’s wishes and flashes accrete into a farcepunctuated education -
toward immobility.”63 There is something in the protagonist’s immobility in the face of natural
forces then, that allows his mind a greater freedom and, in this sense, he reminds us of Murphy,
who cannot “…come alive in his mind…” until his “…body [is] appeased…”64 or, to be specific,
tied naked to his “…rocking-chair of undressed teak…”65 by his own hand. Butler writes that,
…Beckett is clearly very concerned to get people to stay still. He blinds and maims them, puts
them in sand, jars, wheelchairs, dustbins and mud. Progressively his characters, talking or silent,
grind to a halt. […] And is all this not an attempt to get rid of the spurious( faslse) sense of purpose
engendered by motion? To get the ‘just-thereness’ of a character on to paper or the stage?66

Consciousness, according to Sartre, is the usurpation of the in-itself and the privation of
being, and Hamm, a consciousness on a quest for absolute domination, would remove all traces of
his attachment to materiality. The battle against the physical, contingent world (begun, we might
say, in Act Without Words I), is a constant occupation for Hamm as

As we move from Act Without Words I, through Endgame, to Company, we can chart
something like a false evolution of consciousness for the Beckettian protagonist as he tries, but
fails, to flee his physical reality. In Act Without Words I, the protagonist is doomed to failure and
humiliation until he turns his focus away from his physical needs and towards the awakening of
his psyche; he communicates this shift in consciousness however, using the only means available
to him: his body. Act Without Words I’s closing snapshot of man retreating into his psyche in
order to attain sovereignty in an unyielding exterior wasteland becomes, we might say, the central
image of Endgame;

Being-in-the-World and the Call of Conscience The opening of Beckett’s 1956 mime Act
Without Words I sees a man “…flung backwards…”15 into an alien landscape, where he finds
himself alone, without guidance, ineffectual and insignificant, thwarted by nature at every tentative
step, as he tries to find his footing on a terrain that will not yield to him. The protagonist is, perhaps,
a representative for mankind, Sartre’s existential man, or Martin Heidegger’s16 Dasein (the
“…entity which each of us is himself and which includes inquiring as one of the possibilities of its
Being…”17), and the scene is arguably one depicting everyman’s unceremonious entrance to the
world stage. Upon being hurled into life, the new and unsuspecting arrival, lacking foresight and
little realising that his efforts will be in vain, “…gets up immediately, dusts himself, turns aside,
reflects.”18 As the subject of Beckett’s mime takes stock of his physical situation and indeed, his
situatedness19, we might say that the audience are exposed to an illustration of existentialism-in-
action and, on surface-level alone, there are certainly parallels with Heidegger’s account of
Dasein’s “…‘thrownness’ . . . into its ‘there’…”20, or into facticity, and this particular Beckettian
flinging of a body into being. Once he is on his feet, the protagonist, perhaps fearing abandonment
(but also by way of ensuring that the spectator does not miss the significance of the gesture), returns
to the wing that he was expelled from, upon hearing a whistle, only to be “…flung back…”21
again. This business is repeated at the opposite wing and looks set to be enacted a third time until
our hero realises, upon reflection, or upon allowing his mind to infiltrate and inform his physicality,
that he does not have to continue with the game, as he has responsibility and freedom of choice
when it comes to his own body, whether he wants them or not. “Man” is, from the outset,
condemned, according to Sartre: “Condemned, because he did not create himself, yet is
nevertheless at liberty, and from the moment that he is thrown into this world he is responsible for
everything he does.”22 Added to this, man, in spite of his freedom, is always already “thrown”;
he is bound by facticity and placed in a physical situation (historical, geographical, sociological,
and biological) over which he has little control, but which will determine his choices. more, of all
of the diverse artistic modes of representation that Beckett experiments with, the mime is perhaps
the most perfectly suited to the illustration of an embodied philosophy, sharing, as it does, many
of the key principles fundamental to the theories of Sartre and Merleau-Ponty.

A fundamental structure of human reality, or Dasein (which, in terms of its etymological

construction, literally means: “Being-there”25), is its being-in-the-world26 , and according to
Heidegger, “…Dasein itself – and this means also its Being-in-the-world – gets its ontological
understanding of itself in the first instance from those entities which it itself is not but which it
encounters ‘within’ its world and from the Being which they possess.”27 The protagonist of Act
Without Words I is presented to us as a conscious body which stands out in the factical situation
which constitutes its physical reality and, in its concrete thereness, as a biological entity which has
literally been thrown into a stage world populated by inconsistent in-itself objects. As the subject
of Beckett’s mime moves through his world, he is informed at all times by the objects that are
presented to him, in a seemingly(random) haphazard way, from the flies above. The protagonist
of this short play, in trimming his nails with the scissors that descend from the heavens, and
stacking the cubes that appear via the same route in order to try to reach the carafe of water that is
cruelly dangled out of his reach, attempts to utilise those few “…‘Things’ (res)…”28 that he has
access to in his “…concernful dealings”29 with the world. The body, here, realizes the will of
consciousness, surpassing itself in order to manipulate those in-itself objects that it knows might
passively enable it to fulfil its potential (quench its thirst for instance). Where the relation of
consciousness to the body is existential then, “…the relation between the body-as-point-of-view
and things is an objective relation…”30, making the body aware of itself as subject and centre of
conscious activity. A human body is the central organising perspective of each individual
consciousness; it is the “there” around which other objects in the word are organised. As Merleau-
Ponty writes: “The body is the vehicle of being in the world, and having a body is, for a living
creature, to be intervolved in a definite environment, to identify oneself with certain projects and
be continually committed to them.”31 The lone figure that Beckett throws into the desert in Act
Without Words I attempts to engage his body in crucial projects that might ensure his biological
survival in an environment that he did not choose to inhabit and, in between each burst of physical
activity, he “…reflects…”32 so that he might use his physicality intelligently, in order to outfox
the malevolent governing power that would keep him from certain existential necessities and
threaten his very being-in-the-world.

After a prolonged and futile effort to seize his physical possibilities, which include drinking
water, taking shelter, and the ultimate act of existential agency, suicide, the isolated being in the
desolate landscape, “…quickly learns the factical limitations of his situation.”33 The water, for
this castaway, will always be out of reach in relation to his body, respite from the glare of the sun
will never be anything more than fleeting, and the means of ending physiological existence will
be removed before any definitive action can be taken, as an invisible puppet-master, of sorts,
moves this world in mysterious ways. With this hard-won knowledge, however, comes what looks
like dejection, and Act Without Words I ends with a seemingly-defeated protagonist “…lying on
his side, his face towards auditorium, staring before him.”34 In such brooding states of mind, or
bad moods, as Heidegger terms them, “…Dasein becomes blind to itself, the environment with
which it is concerned veils itself, the circumspection of concern gets led astray.”35 Indeed, as the
player’s attentions turn from the unknown exterior forces that have dangled what Kaelin describes
as “…nature’s paraphernalia” before his eyes and signalled “…passing phenomena”36 by the
harsh blow of a whistle, to the interior forces of his existence, he becomes increasingly detached
from his physical reality, his being-in-the-world, and lapses into what looks like inertia. Sartre
suggests that when a connection with the plane of actuality becomes too great a demand on our
psychic life: “When the task is too difficult and we cannot maintain the higher behaviour
appropriate to it, the psychic energy released takes another path; we adopt an inferior behaviour,
which necessitates a lesser psychic tension.”37 Our player, then, after presenting to us his version
of the classic tale of man pitted against nature, lies “… defeated, having opted out of the
struggle…”38, and makes his retreat to the “…plane of reflection.”39 He “opts out”

of engagement with the unmanageable and arbitrary occurrences that create in him a
“psychic tension” and render him unable to unite the instinct and the intellect, and instead seeks
solace in the predictability of his thoughts alone. S. E. Gontarski suggests that: “From the first the
protagonist is a thinker, but inadequately created or adapted to deal with hostile environmental
forces.”40 The reflective consciousness could be viewed as the protagonist’s downfall in Act
Without Words I then, as his tendency to intellectualise his every move supresses the animal
instinct that would perhaps serve him better than continuous reflection in his given circumstances.
As his physical activity decreases however, we might say that the subject’s psychical activity
increases, and so we could equally see his introspection not as “an inferior behaviour” but as his
salvation or rebellion. What is more, as this Beckett creation ceases his physical stumbling, we see
mind inhabiting matter in a much more concentrated and potent sense. So Act Without Words I
ends with what looks like a despondent protagonist lying, face towards the audience, on the stage
floor. The mime is not the first Beckett stage protagonist to end his drama horizontally however;
Victor Krap, prototype male lead from Beckett's first full-length play Eleuthéria41, also lies on his
side in an act of rebellion in the face of the final curtain. Unlike his successor, however, Victor (a
quintessentially “existentialist” antihero, who spends the entirety of the as-yet-unperformed play
in a selfimposed imprisonment, isolated and confined to the small room he inhabits rather than live
with his parents who represent a bourgeois, “inauthentic” society that he openly shuns, choosing
to carve his own path, to “choose himself”, in a Sartrean sense, even though this choice costs him
his being-in-the-world), lies with “…his scrawny back turned on mankind”42. The central
character of Act Without Words I may be “down” at the end of the play but, unlike an evidently
“closed off” Victor, he is not out; he not only faces the audience but shows them his hand (literally,
as the closing stage direction details his looking at his hands43), his consciousness of the situation,
his awareness of his own body, perhaps even his contemplation of his mind’s relationship with his
body. This is a man who, despite being cast into a deserted landscape and buffeted relentlessly
from pillar to post, will not be defeated, unlike Victor, who withdraws, plays victim, and adopts
an “inferior behaviour” despite his

Through prescriptive authorship of stage directions, rather than dialogue, Beckett exposes
the relationship between the signifier and the signified, as he transforms normative linguistic
narration into dramatic action, and turns silence into man’s essential discovery of self. It is the
performing body that takes centre stage in Act Without Words I, as it becomes the medium through
which the playwright’s ideas are channelled, and Beckett manages to progress from mere
substitution of the word by the deed, to a depiction of the awakening of the consciousness of man,
as demonstrated by a decrease in physical animation of character; the resulting internal conflict is
perhaps one which can only be demonstrated by a live performer in the theatre, sans paroles. In a
rather scathing criticism of Act Without Words I, John Spurling writes that, in the drama, Beckett
uses,

Act Without Words I captures “…the bare essentials of a human life subsisting in an
environment that continually changes without regard to human purposes and which supports
human life or not, depending upon man’s ability to bring instinct and intelligence into effective
harmony for the fulfilment of his needs and desires.”61 It is surprising that an essay written in
1972 has not tapped into a philosophy which was virtually its contemporary; the “banality” of the
piece is surely a direct reflection of the routine, mundane repetition that comprises, and
compromises, so much of our everyday lives, particularly when it comes to the fundamental
necessities of watering and sheltering that physical element of ourselves that can seem to act as
antithesis to the imaginative faculties of consciousness. Spurling further argues that, …when
Beckett ceases to speak he ceases to speak to himself and begins playing charades. It becomes
clear that the physical movements, gestures, comic routines which form an accompaniment to the
words in all his plays are no more than accompaniment; the real action in Beckett’s plays is in the
words and between the words.

12- Act Without Words Symbols, Allegory and Motifs

These notes were contributed by members of the GradeSaver community. We are thankful for
their contributions and encourage you to make your own.

Written by Timothy Sexton

Light
The opening words of the published play that situate the setting are “Desert. Dazzling light.” The
use of light as a symbol is a recurring motif throughout Beckett’s work. Light and illumination
are inherent symbols of the apprehension of consciousness in man.
Whistle
The whistle that draws the man’s attention and seems to guide him toward action represents
some sort of external guiding force. The fact that the whistle generally has the effect of tempting
the man to do something which he will not be able to do suggests it is a malevolent guide; the
tempter as devil.
The Fling
The man seems to be flung onto the stage at various intervals as if against his will; as if being
tossed into an existence over which there is no control. This symbolic act actually relates the
play back to a concept established by the philosopher Martin Heidegger: Geworfenheit which
translates literally into “thrownness.” The symbolism is here rather firmly firmly established as
linking the man being flung onto the stage as comparable to the act of birth; an act which is
utterly absurd as no one asks for it, but must deal with the consequences.
The Tree
The tree provides only physical comfort and thus becomes a representative symbol of those
elements of the word which we seek solely for the basic necessities. In this case, shelter from the
heat of the desert.
Scissors, Rope and Cubes
The scissors, the rope, and the cubes are symbols of reason. Thrust into existence against his
will, the man must evolve and adapt. Recognizing the value of water as not just immediate
gratification, but essential to long term existence, the tools which have been made available only
become useful through trial and error. Ultimately, of course, they prove to be useless, but such is
the path of rationality. One must comprehend logic before it can be successfully applied.

Act Without Words Metaphors and Similes

the palms closed like a parasol
In Act Without Words, the sole simile is "The palms closed like a parasol," referring to the tree
that descended from the fly. After the man cut his nail with scissors, the stage directions say that
the palms closed like a parasol. Since it is the only simile or metaphor, in the play it is quite
significant. The tree closing represents the "shadow" being gone because a parasol would cast a
shadow and keep the sun away. When the tree dries up, it dies, and it closes up, and it no longer
casts a shadow. The significance of the shadow is the parallel between "the tree of life" and the
man.

Act Without Words Irony

The Carafe
Notably, the play is set in a desert. Amazingly, a carafe labeled WATER appears from nowhere.
He goes to it and tries to reach it, but it remains out of his reach. The one thing he needs more
than anything under his present circumstances and it is out of reach. Could the irony be any
sharper? Yes. On two counts, actually. The first being that a small carafe of water may not even
be worth all the effort; it certainly won't be enough sustenance to prolong existence
The Cubes
The irony gets even sharper, however. Maybe a small carafe of water won’t be enough to
prolong existence, but at least it will provide temporary relief, meet a pressing need and satiate
what would otherwise prove to be an energy-wasting sense of profound annoyance. And then
comes the cubes. Rational though it developed and he realizes he has a way of reaching the
carafe that has remained out of reach. Only the cubes are of no assistance as the water remains
temptingly beyond grasp.
The Rope
The rope begins as another tool to be used to acquire life-sustaining water. Or, at least, enough
water to satisfy immediate thirst. Twice he tries in two completely different fashions to use the
rope as assistance in purchasing the water and twice more he is denied. Ironically, what had been
viewed as a tool to extend life is now used as a tool to end life; he attempts to hang himself with
the rope. More irony: at that exact moment, the boughs of the tree collapse, making it impossible
lasso the noose for the use of suicide.
The Whistle
An off-stage, disembodied whistle acts to guide the man’s attention. For much of the play, he
only makes a move or decision when he hears the whistles. The various objects which appear
from seemingly nowhere do not seem to attract his attention until the whistle alerts him. The
whistle is thus an agent of consciousness as well as an agent of temptation. The irony is that it
only when his consciousness is raised that he faces temptation and every time he gives into
temptation he is disappointed. Much effort and disappointment could have been avoided by
simply ignoring the whistle’s implication.
Ignoring the Whistle
The general interpretation is that the man has become so frustrated by the evil influence wielded
by the whistling agent of temptation that his pose of silent immobility on which the play ends
represents hopelessness and despairs. Other take note that it is only when the man no longer
heeds the call of the whistle and ignores its agency at tempter, that the objects which have caused
his frustration disappear, thus no longer presenting a vain enticement. This interpretation argues
for a much more ironic understanding of the man’s silent immobility. That he has ascended to
the same level of the whistle; he is now the one in charge. Or, at the very least, he is no longer
under the submission of the manipulator.

Act Without Words Imagery

The Tossed Man
The dominating image of the play is that of the man being flung backward into the stage before
each of his ironic adventures. The physicality of this image is highly suggestive of a force being
responsible for the action. It is a case of physics; motion requires force since the force is invisible
and the man is incapable of actually leaving the stage, the implicit assumption must be that a
god-like being is the power behind the force. If that is so, then the imagery leads to the further
postulation the god-like being wants the man to undergo the tortuous events which take place.
Tantalized
Most of those actions which take place present images of the man desperately attempting to get
something that is either out of reach or pulled back from him as he attempts to grasp for it. He
can’t reach the carafe of water when it first appears and then is given the mechanism of
accomplishing this task with boxes to stack on each other only to have the boxes pulled out from
under him. The man is purposely being tantalized with things he is now allowed to have, thus
raising the question of what kind of god is behind such misery. What is the purpose of such an
existence?
The Whistle
The god-entity makes its presence known to the man through the repetition of auditory imagery.
The whistle draws attention to something of interest appearing on stage or else initiates the
physical actions of the man. A whistle has certain relatively universal connotations in the modern
world: a whistle may be used to direct traffic, in the training of a dog or to initiate or halt the
competitive activity in a sporting event. The point being that the sound of a whistle has become a
tool for conditioning humans. The man on stage is seen mindlessly responding to this powerfully
resonant image of conditioning until finally, without warning, he no longer does. His lack of
reaction makes the sound of the whistle all the more noticeable due to the fact that most of us
respond to whistles without much in the way of conscious reasoning.
Desert
The action takes places on a stage sparsely adorned to resemble a desert. Into this barren
landscape appears items one would assume as necessities: a tree offering meager shade, but shade
nonetheless, and a water bottle. Attempts to enjoy the use of both prove vain. Whoever or whatever
is tossing him backwards, kicking over the boxes and otherwise providing him with on the
tantalizing but unreachable solutions to his most obvious problems can be accurately said to have
to deserted all expectations of benevolence. In the end, the man decides to desert his god by no
longer responding to conditioned responses. The setting thus becomes imagery reflecting a
symbolic wasteland of place and character.