Samuel Beckett’s Endgame is a complex analysis of politics in a seemingly apolitical and empty world. As Hamm and Clov inhabit the aftermath of Marxism, they display characteristics of the bourgeoisie and proletariat respectively, but only retain them so they can define themselves as something. The work implicitly argues- through the setting, and by defining Hamm and Clov as the bourgeoisie and proletariat- that political platforms are simply human rationalizations in futile opposition to a meaningless world, pointing towards Beckett’s ideological message of existential nihilism.
The setting of Endgame suggests that it occurs in end of a Marxist cycle, where it will not begin again. The inferences to the natural world play an important part in this: “It won’t rain,”(Beckett 54, 552) and Hamm can only dream of “those forests” (Beckett 27, 551) that would serve as natural capital to reinvigorate the business cycle. By Clov’s admission, the outside is dead and grey “from pole to pole”(Beckett 534, 558). All of the references to the idea that “nature has forgotten [Hamm and Clov]” (Beckett 171 553) mean that the materialism at the heart of Marxism lies unfulfilled. Marx stated in his Communist Manifesto that “the oppressor and oppressed, [stand] in constant oppositions to one another, [and the cycle would be] ended, either in a revolutionary reconstitution of society at large, or in the common ruin of the contending classes.” (15) The latter has occurred because in Beckett’s world, there is neither the means to continue production, nor the life to sustain it. If Marxism is based on dialectic materialism - that is the notion that society is based on the push and pull between who owns the basic means of production- Beckett informs th...
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...ession, Hamm and Clov act the class roles of bourgeoisie and proletariat though it defies meaningful progress. Through this Beckett implies that the political systems we create are nothing more than an attempt to stave of the nothingness that really exists. More of the play could be analyzed regarding the delusion of Marxism, especially with regards to the characters of Nagg and Nell. Further study might include also the consideration of the authors time period and how historicism is tied into the meaning of the play.
Works Cited
Beckett, Samuel. Endgame. The Wadsworth Anthology of Drama. Ed. William B. Worthen. 6th ed. Boston, MA: Wadsworth Cengage Learning, 2011. 551-71. Print.
Marx, Karl, Friedrich Engels, and Vladimir Lenin. The Essential Left: Four Classic Texts on the Principles of Socialism. 7th. London: George Allen & Unwin Ltd, 1981. 15-21. Print.
... Brontё and Shakespeare focus on presenting the outcast as the epitome human complexity; Shakespeare allows a deep insight into Hamlets internal conflictions and the emphasis on how corrupted Claudius becomes to better understand Hamlet’s role as the outsider, where Brontё’s decision to make Heathcliff her hero can be read as an intervention into the Victorian prejudice against outsiders, such as gypsies and beggars. Rather more explicitly, Kesey is unequivocally concerned with the place of the individual within society and the means by which society seeks to impose order at the expense of independence and freedom. Thus they can all be read as fundamentally aiming to expose the oppressions of the unjustifications of capitalism and feudalism, to which these characters rebel, particularly the abuse of power and authority to control and manipulate a conforming society.
The play also conveys a strong political message. The play encourages the idea of socialism, a society in which responsibility and community are essential, also a place where the community all work together and are responsible for their actions. This is in contrast to capitalism. JB priestly wrote the play in 1945, but it was set in 1912 just before the war, it was later performed in 1946. The play was written after World War I and World War II, Priestley used this to his advantage, it makes the audience feel awful after what has just happened, the majority of the audience would have either lived through one or both of the wars.
William Shakespeare was one of the first to introduce many to the distinct divide in social class and those who where in power. Some of Shakespeare 's most famous literatures & playwrights tell the stories and air the dirty laundry of people associated high in power and social class. In William Shakespeare’s Hamlet Shakespeare gives many examples of social class and power and how they both can destroy and disrupt when greed and unrighteousness gets in the way. He also proves how both social class and power can break, manipulate, and ruin individuals caught up in the dramas of social class and power. It is without question that William Shakespeare 's Hamlet teaches us the truth about power
As an avant-garde writer and a trend starter, Beckett was intensely in touch with his own time and its most significant realities, one of which being technological progress. In his play Krapp’s Last Tape, first performed in 1958, we meet yet another one of his spiritually crippled and disillusioned characters: Krapp, an old recluse. Krapp is alone on the stage, seconded only by a tape player/recorder. As an embodiment of his memory, the machine completes Krapp and provides him with a link to his past, a grounding force which serves to give him a stronger presence. Ultimately, however, Krapp is no better off than analogous characters in Beckett’s work. Whatever crumbs of hope the machine may bring, the core of the human problem is still the human condition, and that itself may not be changed by any form of insight into the past, however clear.
Several aspects of Marxism can be seen over the course of the play The Tempest. There is a social and economic divide between characters, which creates tension between them throughout the play. Readers can see what is means to have power and how this power can be abused in order to mistreat others. In particular, Marxism ideologies can be applied specifically to the characters Prospero and Caliban. Prospero, a magician uses his power, to treat Caliban in an inhumane way. No matter what Caliban does, he will always be placed on the lower end of the economic ladder. Shakespeare’s powerful play, gives readers a new way to look at and appreciate reading and analyzing this piece, by looking at it through the perspective of a Marxist theorist.
Through Shakespeare’s play, Hamlet, if looked at carefully, one can see many aspects of Marxist thought in the story. When analysing Hamlet through a Marxist critical lens, you need to pay close attention to the interactions between characters in different classes. (add sentence)
Stoppard gives Rosencrantz and Guildenstern an existence outside ‘Hamlet’, although it is one of little significance and they idle away their time only having a purpose for their lives when the play rejoins the ‘Hamlet’ plot, after they have been called by the King’s messenger: “There was a messenger.that’s right. We were sent for.” Their lives end tragically due to this connection with ‘Hamlet’, predetermined by the title, but the role provided them with a purpose to their otherwise futile lives, making them bearable. Their deaths evoke sadness and sympathy, leaving the reader grieving for them. In contrast to Stoppard’s play ‘Waiting for Godot’ is much bleaker in the respect that Vladimir and Estragon seem to have no purpose or direction in their lives.
In his article "'Funeral Bak'd Meats:' Carnival and the Carnivalesque in Hamlet," Michael D. Bristol mingles Marxism and Bakhtin's notion of double discoursed textuality into an unique reading of Shakespeare's drama as a struggle between opposing economic classes. Bristol opens with a two paragraph preface on Marxism, highlighting Marx's own abnegation of Marxism: "Marx is famous for the paradoxical claim that he was not a Marxist" (Bristol 348). While he acknowledges some of the flaws inherent in Marxist criticism, Bristol uses the introductory paragraphs to assert the "enormous importance" of "the theory of class consciousness and class struggle" which Marxist theory includes (349). Having prepared readers for a discourse whose foundation lies upon "the most fundamental idea in Marxism," Bristol recasts Hamlet as a class struggle.
Shakespeare’s Much Ado about Nothing is, on the surface, a typical romantic comedy with a love-plot that ends in reconciliation and marriage. This surface level conformity to the conventions of the genre, however, conceals a deeper difference that sets Much Ado apart. Unlike Shakespeare’s other romantic comedies, Much Ado about Nothing does not mask class divisions by incorporating them into an idealized community. Instead of concealing or obscuring the problem of social status, the play brings it up explicitly through a minor but important character, Margaret, Hero’s “waiting gentlewoman.” Shakespeare suggests that Margaret is an embodiment of the realistic nature of social class. Despite her ambition, she is unable to move up in hierarchy due to her identity as a maid. Her status, foiling Hero’s rich, protected upbringing, reveals that characters in the play, as well as global citizens, are ultimately oppressed by social relations and social norms despite any ambition to get out.
While Beckett’s works are often defined by their existentialist themes, Endgame seems to offer no solution to the despair and melancholia of Hamm, Clov, Nagg, and Nell. The work is replete with overdetermination that confounds the efforts of critics and philosophers to construct a single, unified theme for the play. Beckett resisted any effort to reconcile the problems of his world, offer solutions, or quench any fears overtly. However, this surface level of understanding that aligns Beckett with the pessimism of the Modernist movement is ironically different from the symbolic understanding that Beckett promotes through his characters and the scene. Beckett’s work does not suggest total hopelessness, but rather that the fears of change, self-centeredness, and despair of Hamm and Clov contribute to their miserable existence. He opposes the Modernist attitude of focus on the subjective, internal state, and reveals the soul of the Modernist to be shallow and starving.
The three stories, The Endgame (Beckett), The Dumbwaiter (Pinter), and The Horse Dealer's Daughter (Lawrence) all deal with the themes of repression, repetition, and breakdowns in communication. The stories show us the subjectivity of language and exemplify the complexities of the human condition.
Shakespeare’s Hamlet is a tragic play about murder, betrayal, revenge, madness, and moral corruption. It touches upon philosophical ideas such as existentialism and relativism. Prince Hamlet frequently questions the meaning of life and the degrading of morals as he agonizes over his father’s murder, his mother’s incestuous infidelity, and what he should or shouldn’t do about it. At first, he is just depressed; still mourning the loss of his father as his mother marries his uncle. After he learns about the treachery of his uncle and the adultery of his mother, his already negative countenance declines further. He struggles with the task of killing Claudius, feeling burdened about having been asked to find a solution to a situation that was forced upon him.Death is something he struggles with as an abstract idea and as relative to himself. He is able to reconcile with the idea of death and reality eventually.
piece a modernist one. The play’s dialogue, technology, and the fragmentation of the piece, are
The transformation of a Shakespearean Revenge Tragedy into an Absurd Drama means a considerable change in structure from a well-structured and rigid format, into a chaotic and formless play. Stoppard deliberately alters the configuration of the play to create a confusing atmosphere, which creates the exact feeling of society in the 1960s- no definites or certainties to rely on. Language portrays meaning in both plays- the language of Rosencrantz and Guildenstern are Dead differs to that of Hamlet. Stoppard employs meaningless colloquial exchanges, such as Rosencrantz and Guildenstern’s question game, which strongly contrasts to Shakespearean elaborate and poetic verse, as seen throughout the play, especially in Hamlet’s soliloquies- “There is sp...
...on. Vol. 34. Georgia State University, 2001. 39-53. H. W. Wilson Web. 22 Mar. 2004.