Waiting For The Absent Other

Clifford Odets's Waiting for Lefty, Eugene O'Neill's The Iceman Cometh and Samuel Beckett's Waiting for Godot share a common theme that the present characters wait for the absent Other that symbolizes the Savior image. Centered on this similarity, my dissertation compares and analyzes the three plays from the following three aspects:"'Waiting'as an Archetype,""The Other Symbolizing a Savior Image,"and"Absent Presence of The Other."The"waiting"theme, as an archetype, embodies a genetic inheritance in the three plays. Although written in different eras, the waiting image in the three plays shares similar patterns: the trade union members are eagerly waiting for Lefty's arrival; the derelicts are anxiously waiting for Hickey's arrival; the tramps are expectantly waiting for Godot's arrival. Impacted by various social and cultural surroundings, however, the waiting image demonstrates its individual characteristics in each play along with its nature of inheritance. The trade union members'waiting for Lefty bears realistic traits. It indicates their loyalty to a proletarian leader. The Iceman Cometh shows the realistic as well as absurdist qualities of the derelicts'waiting. Their waiting in drunken illusions is the means of survival for modern man designated by O'Neill who is deeply influenced by the Nietzschen philosophy and impending World War II. Waiting for Godot exposes the absurd existence of modern man as well as Beckett's uncertainty of the world and concerns about human prospects under the impact of World War II and absurdist theories based on existentialism. Based on Descartes's meditations on the infinite God, Emmanuel Levinas regards God, the Infinite, as the Other of the finite human beings. God is the trinity of the Holy Father, the Holy son Jesus——the Savior——and the Holy Spirit. Lefty in Waiting for Lefty, the awaited-old Hickey in The Iceman Cometh and Godot in Waiting for Godot all symbolize a savior image and they are the Other in each play. They exist in scripts but not in presentation. They are absent characters of the three plays. Although they are absent, their absent presence is represented by the act of waiting and the expectation of the present characters. In light of theories of action and expectation in phenomenology, the act of waiting and the expectation of the present characters of the three plays are compared and analyzed. The comparison and analysis of the"waiting"theme in the three chosen plays hopefully will add to our understanding of the recurrent"waiting"theme in drama.