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Religious Beliefs on Becketts Works Compared to Atheism

of Camus’s Work

Research Question: How are Camus and Becketts Works

Compared in the Terms of Absurdism?

Subject: language and literature

Category: 2

Word count: 3502

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Table of Contents

Introduction...........................................................................................................3

Authors Beliefs………………………………………………………………….4

Waiting for Godot Religious Interpretations........................................................4

The Stranger Religious Interpretations.................................................................6

Existentialism in Both Works...............................................................................7

Waiting for Godot and the Society......................................................................11

The Stranger and the Society...............................................................................12

Conclusion……………………………………………………………………...13

Referneces...........................................................................................................15
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Introduction

The novel Waiting for Godot was published by absurdist and nihilist Samuel Beckett in 1949.

It is a play that represents the problem of living with religious and spiritual beliefs. Many believe

that the word Godot refers to god but Samuel Beckett declares and says that if I meant god by

Godot, I would have said god. The main character of the story never appears or shows a sign that

they will appear in the story, and that is what makes the audience curious. The novel The

Stranger, written by Albert Camus in 1942, shows the difference between an absurdist and

nihilist through the main character who is Meursault. Because there is no truth or coherence in

the universe in his perspective. The characters in Waiting for Godot are very religious whilst in

The Stranger it is the complete opposite and the character has no belief in God. In this essay, the

authors beliefs, religious interpretations, existentialism, and the society in both works will be

elaborated on, also talking about how Camus and Becketts works are compared in terms of

absurdism.

Authors Beliefs

Kypriou (2000) believed that Camus idea of god was more ruthless like the “old testament”

and is rather calmer. His idea suggests that lots of understanding of readers worries are related to

Camus exact and opposite relation with the idea of a supreme being. Camus was never got

introduced with the idea of god. Anti-Christian characters are dependent on Beckett tone on

religion with his tendency to criticize works of art by religious peoples opinion without

recognizing the independence of art; Failure of reputation Beckett's goal can be to get human
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beings out of all kinds of metaphysics Either theistic or atheistic discourse; rejection of offer, the

lyrical and mysterious tones of a few sections of his work.

Religious Interpretations

In Waiting for Godot, it has many religious ideas, and many biblical elements and symbols.

At the very first part Vladimir asks Estragon if he has read the bible or not. The background

image of the tree which is shown has a religious interpretation because religious people view it

as an image of cross and that is where Jesus was crucified. Estragon is scared if Godot punishes

them then he says what if Godot, comes Vladimir responds that they will be saved. Estragon

thinks that Godot will give them punishment nevertheless Vladimir believes that Godot is a

rescuer that is what everyone thinks about whoever they believe. In other words, everyone has

their own interpretations and own beliefs. Both characters are waiting for someone who would

never come or appear. Even though the story is named after Godot, this person never appears.

Thus, the futility of waiting resembles the futility of life of a believer. In this sense, there are

absurdist elements in the play.

Vladimir: Did you ever read the Bible?

Estragon: The bible... [ He reflects.] I must have taken a look at it.

Vladimir: Do you remember the Gospels?

Estragon: I remember the maps of the Holy Land. Coloured they were. Very pretty.

The Dead Sea was pale blue. The very look of it made me thirsty. That’s where we’ll go, I

used to say, that’s where we’ll go for our honeymoon. We’ll swim. We’ll be happy.

(Beckett, 1952, p.8).

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This shows that Estragon once had religious ideals and notions and that he took for granted

although apparently, he's had a change of mind and path. He expresses his view of reading the

Bible and the messages he got from the Bible. Estragon believes whatever he has in mind such as

the pale blue water, then he would go for our honeymoon and would take a swim. Estragon

imagines what he has read from the bible and tries to sketch it for Vladimir.

Estragon: Charming spot. Inspiring prospects. Let's go.

Vladimir: We can't.

Estragon: Why not?

Vladimir: We're waiting for Godot.

Estragon: Ah! You’re sure it was here?

Vladimir: What?

Estragon: That we were to wait

Vladimir: He said by the tree [they look at the tree]. Do you see any others?

(Beckett, 1952, p.10).

This shows that each of the characters are involved in their own realms of thought and that they

have internal problems which need to be assessed. This author believes the above tree is the

place where Jesus was supposedly crucified. Christian people believe that the tree is a sign of

cross. Estragon tries to go although Vladimir stops him and tells him to stop because they are

waiting for Godot and they are scared if Godot gives them punishments on condition that they

are not waiting for him. The opening conversation between Vladimir and Estragon proves that

the allusion to God through Godot is not unreasonable. Vladimir immediately drives the
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conversation towards religion and the Bible. He reminds Estragon of “one of the thieves we

saved” (Beckett, 1952, p.9)

Vladimir explains that only one of the four Gospels portrays the thief as being saved and that

nowadays most people follow that version. It is still the beginning of the play nonetheless it

seems that this could be the first criticism on the part of Beckett.

The Stranger Religious Interpretations

The Stranger does not generally have many religious interpretations. The hero in The

Stranger who is Meursault has no belief in God. Meursault lives an empty life, and he does not

believe in ani ideology. He does not even feel sorry after they told him you must be executed.

After this news also he feels like life is meaningless and at the end everyone must die so it does

not matter now or few years later.

Meursault loses his faith in life, God, and the society because of his lack of understanding and

comprehending his feelings and emotions. If the purpose of religion is to bring people together in

unity and also give them a sense of hope, then why is Meursault so uninterested and unaffected

by any of the events that took place during the novel such as his mother’s funeral, his

relationship with Marie? The real purpose of Meursault acts the way he does is because he loses

his faith in himself and humanity.

Nothing, nothing mattered, and I knew why. So did he. Throughout the whole absurd life

I’ve lived, a dark wind had been rising toward me from somewhere deep in my future.

Across the years that were still to come, and as it passed, this wind leveled whatever was

offered to me at the time, in years no more reals than the ones I was living. What did other

people’s death or a mother’s love matter to me; what did his god or the lives people choose
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or the fate they think they elect matter to me when were all elected by the same fate, me

and billions of privileged people like him who also called themselves my brothers?

(Camus,1942, p.121).

Meursault says and thinks that, if one is going to die, God should not matter to people.

Meursault believes that people who whether worship or not are going to have the same

ending and nothing would change. He goes back to his mother’s love to him and people’s

death and says does it even matter to me. Meursault declares that do the people who

worship God choose their own fate, no it is the same for everyone all of us are going to

face death at the end and that is the only certainty that everyone needs to believe in. He

speaks about how he was executed and the reason was because he did not cry at his

mother’s funeral. Afterwards he talks about Salamanos dog who passed away and he says

it was worth just as much as his wife. Life, to an absurdist such as Camus, has essentially

no meaning, so the life of a dog and a person are of no importance.

In general, the novel The Stranger does not have many religious interpretations because the main

character does not symbolize any in the story. He lives a very separate life from everyone by

being an atheist. He tries to be separated from everyone in this world by making it obvious to

himself that he is empty of feelings and social understanding.

Existentialism in Both Works

Infanta & Shanthchitra (2016) believed that existentialists tend to rule out their own ideas

which are social constraints, into society. Destroying structure, norms and morals lead to

existentialism since there would be a lack of understanding towards ones identify. Changes to the

structure of society can make set barriers to existentialists. Human nature is shocked when the
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freedom of choice is restricted and we fall into the problem between structure and personal

wantings.

It is seen frequently throughout the book, The Stranger, that there are several examples of

existentialism. During the second fight in the beach when Meursault shoots the Arab with

Raymond’s gun, one of the Arabs draws his knife and holds it up to Meursault, he is not bothered

by the Arab’s threatening action. The author shows that Meursault does not care about anything.

“The scorching blade slashed at my eyelashes and stabbed at my stinging eyes.” (Camus, 1942,

p.59).

The writer writes what Meursault says when the Arab grabs his knife to attack Meursault, the

protagonist has no belief; for him all that is are physical sensations. Thus, he prevents Raymond

from committing murder, and at the moment of feeling threatened, he shoots the Arab because

for a man who has no sense of acceptance towards the values in the world, it is not hard to kill

someone. Meursault shoots the Arab because of his confusion from the sun, because it was

hurting his eyes and causing him to hallucinate. The Arab’s knife is reflecting with the suns light,

then he decided to shoot him with Raymond’s gun. The author shows Meursault as an absurd

hero, because an absurd hero is the one who lives life with no purpose because there is no truth

or logic in the universe, in which the absurd hero cannot hold values. The protagonist was

attached to the physical world and he was very different from the people that were around him.

“I squeezed my hand around the revolver” (Camus, 1942, p.59) and the protagonist of the story

kills the Arab. As a result, Meursault had to get in jail, and he had to change his daily routine. He

would spend sixteen to eighteen hours a day sleeping. This is what he did to make his time pass.

It was passing to slow for him. At the end, Meursault was given a death sentence because of his

murder. Albert Camus intended to show Meursault as an absurd hero; therefore, he had to give
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Meursault that uncaring and unkindness inside him. “Meursault and Marie would have lunch

together, swim together, and watch movies together”. (Camus,1942, p.35), he was physically

attached to Marie however he was not emotionally attached to her yet. Meursault says that “her

tan made her face look like a flower” (Camus, 1942, p.34). He was physically - but not

emotionally - attached to Mary. Meursault also mentions that her tan makes her face stand out

like a flower, possibly implying that he finds her face to have a specific importance to him or

that it makes him feel different compared to his other observations.

The author mentions this at the beginning of the novel because he desired the readers to know

about Meursault’s personality. “Maman died today. Or yesterday, I don’t know. I got a telegram

from the home: Mother deceased. Funeral tomorrow. Faithfully yours. That doesn’t mean

anything. Maybe it was yesterday.” (Camus, 1942, p.1). Meursault does not know when his

mother died. Camus wanted to express the fact that Meursault is completely devoid of feelings.

Waiting for Godot shows a complete type of existentialism. The story talks about someone who

never appears. It makes the readers ask themselves whether Godot actually exists, or not

however there is nothing shown that Godot would appear or not. Vladimir and Estragon spend

the entire time waiting for Godot, who never comes. They are scared of his punishments even

though Godot who refers to God. Which in most occasions god is the one who forgives the ones

that worship him. Waiting for Godot has a slight of nihilism in the work. The life of the character

in the story is meaningless whereas in a different way from that of Meursault who is happy to

meet his faith. He has a sense of freedom by not complying with the expectations of the society.

Meursault has a belief by which he stands to the end. Pozzo, however, chooses to be blind

because he cannot stop thinking about the time. This blindness is the symbol of his ignorance. He

is not aware of how absurd his practice of faith is. Lucky tries to be mute and not speak up and
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the only time lucky speaks is when Pozzo commands him to speak. Pozzo and Lucky are an

antithesis to each other.

After the second world war, the world knows and recognized many differences in the features of

many belongings regarding culture, society, language and more. Many writers around the world

talked about the outcomes of colonizer/colonized relationships. Edward Said is one of the most

important who deals with such cases. Said thinks that the life of the colonizer is still there in the

shape of wars, corrupt ideas and labor. Said usually states that the Western media sets an

inaccurate image about the oriental ideologies and considers it as a very weird set of ideas which

is opposite to the perfect West. Said was the person who change how the western's thought about

the East. So, his books: Orientalism (1978), The Question of Palestine (1979) and Covering

Islam (1981) are appropriate to examine the idea of the other and to show how Said deciphers the

western wrong image about the East. (Mohrem, 2020).

Edward Said was a Palestinian American born, Said was a professor at the Columbia university,

he came up with the Said theory and was mostly known for his orientalism book. Said and

Camus were the authors that wrote after World War II. Said and Camus emphasized on writing

the relationship of people with each other and how they would communicate together. They both

mentioned how the world changed culturally, how the society was changed, and even how

literature was affected by the World War II. The Stranger was written during the World War II,

and a great part of Algeria was considered as the territory of France. The Stranger, reflected and

showed the French-Algerian society during the 1940’s. It reflected a big amount of racism

towards non-French citizens who lived in Algeria.

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Waiting for Godot and the Society

Waiting for Godot has many relations with the society because it revolves around the

connections that the people of the society have. The main characters in the story who are

Vladimir and Estragon are waiting for someone for an unspecified reason, who is Godot. It is

impossible to find out who Godot is, however the audiences can guess that he is someone very

important. Someone who has enough power to command and have that much of respect from the

main characters of the story. Consequently, could view Godot as a member of the social elite,

someone who presumably possesses social influence and probably wealth. The other significant

relationship in the book involves power. Pozzo who is a wealthy landowner is the master of a

slave which he has named Lucky. The former exercises complete control over his servant and

treats Lucky like an animal. He carries all of Pozzo’s belongings with a rope around his neck.

As such, the fact that the main relationships in the novel rely on structures of power, poverty,

class, and a modern industrialized society is visible.

At the end of the play and novel, Lucky leads Pozzo because he is now blind. It's quite visible

that he now has control over and has made him blind of his own choices. Therefore, has changed

the normal relation regarding the rich and the poor. These events can severely change classic

structures and hierarchies of power, though it is not a complete or great change. Both of the

characters Vladimir and Estragon are waiting for Godot until the end. The author tries to picture

karma which is known that if an individual does any harmful action, it would come back to that

same person that is what happened to Pozzo after making Lucky his slave with his money.
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The Stranger and the Society

Meursault acts as a threat towards the society he is in because of his indifference, and he is

not affected by any incident. Meursault who is pictured by an absurd hero and his society is

completely different from each other, especially since he had no reaction to his mother’s death at

the beginning of the novel. People around him think that he should show a deeper sense of

mourning and feel sad for his mother that passed away however he still acts as if nothing ever

happened. This can show that the society has specific understandings or ideas that he does not

accept or just clearly does not want to be a part of. Meursault does not see why it is necessary to

show overwhelming sad emotions since he believes that he cannot change the course of nature.

Eventually, Meursault kills the Arab because of the light annoying his eyes with Raymond’s gun

and when he is being prosecuted by the judges, they make him more guilty because he of how

senseless he is. Meursault does not even care about death he believes that it does not make a

difference if he dies now or few years later.

Sharp (2010) believed that the society in the novel expects people to behave in a particular way

upon the death of a loved one and Meursault’s actions do not follow this line of social normality.

Thus, the relationship between the two is fraught with tension, and one of the themes of the

novel emerges. The existence of the absurd among accepted social norms shows Meursault to be

different to the society, but indifferent towards what is perceived of him.

The society in The Stranger wants people to behave however they want but the novel does not

give the characters the freedom they are worthy of. That is what makes Meursault act different

and he is not satisfied with the situation since he does not have any standards to go by. Sanders

(2019) declared that Meursault is a force of apathy and is defined by his unwillingness to take

part in the emotional or spiritual side of the human experience. His emotions are completely
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blunted and even when this evidence is being used against him, he does not attempt to disguise

himself from the reality of things. This is where Meursault differs from most sociopaths and

narcissists; he never attempts to put on a mask for his gains or ambitions. In fact, he seems to

have none yet he is simply frustrated by the human condition.

Meursault acts without remorse or guilt, and sometimes even without reason. In a society that

operates and introduce its laws largely based upon the assumption that everyone will operate on

a certain moral standard, even if that standard is negative. He never tries to lie by his emotions or

the reactions that he has and everyone knows that the usual human-like emotions that are felt are

not present within Meursault.

Conclusion

In retrospect, The Stranger has no religious interpretations making the main character

completely devoid of any human-like sensations and values whereas in Waiting for Godot the

whole narrative is about a character who tends to represent a god-like figure. The Stranger has

one protagonist, Meursault, and shows the journey of life in which he undertakes and the events

which unfold. Waiting for Godot indirectly focuses more on the beliefs that people have towards

certain beliefs; a higher power. The two works are contradictory towards each other in the sense

that religious and moral beliefs are testified against. Both of the stories in their own aspects

contain a certain amount of obliviousness, and in The Stranger, Meursault might seem very

simple, nevertheless is actually superbly complex character in terms of his actions and feelings.

Moreover, for Waiting for Godot, the characters themselves are confused and just uncertain.

Those are the aspects that make the works complete and pleasing. The novel The Stranger shows

the atheism of Camus and how the main character expresses no certain reaction towards any
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situation; however, Waiting for Godot shows the importance of God in our life and the story has

many religious symbols. Both novels have aspects of absurdism in them nonetheless they are

expressed differently. Camus works tend to focus on individuals more than Beckett’s since his

works express absurdity through the perspective of a group of people which makes it comparably

vaguer at certain times.

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References

Beckett, S. (1952). Waiting for Godot. Faber and Faber publication.

Camus, A. (1942). The Stranger. Random House publishing.

Kypriou, S. (2000). Samuel Beckett. Beyond the problem of god. Literature and Theology,

14(1), pp. 34–51.

Infanta, S. (2016). The Existential Philosophy in J.M Coetzee novel using Edward Said's

Orientalism. Existential consciousness, 2(6), 1.

Mohrem, B. (2020). Examining the concept of the ‘Other’ according to Edward W. Said.
International Journal Online of Humanities
6(2),1.

Maher, E. (2014). Albert Camus and the Dilemma of the Absent God, The Way, 1(43), pp.76-87.

Sharp, K. (2010). The relationship between Meursault and his society in The Stranger by Albert

Camus. enote. retrieved from: https://www.enotes.com/homework-help/what-

relationship-between-meursault-its-society-202893

Sanders, H. (2019). In The Stranger, is Meursault a threat to society? enotes. retrieved from:

https://www.enotes.com/homework-help/meursault-threat-society-422534
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