Catastrofe: l’albero, la luna e i pantaloni

Abstract

Perhaps the most striking thing about En attendant Godot is its alleged maturity. But it is a misleading impression, since the text now available, and obviously the “revised text”, was established only after a number of versions had been tried out. The original French manuscript shows, in fact, that it was a rather hesitant piece of work. In production, just to give an example, the director Roger Blin advised certain cuts for reason of technical effectiveness, and at that stage in his dramatic career Samuel Beckett was only too ready to learn for a professional. So when he undertook the first English translation, he dropped most of the passages Blin leaves out. Beckett continued revising Go- dot from its inception in the late 1940s to the late 1980s. It is thus the only play that non only accumulates his early experiences with theatre, but also is later evolution as a playwright and director of his own plays.