Tag Archives: Waiting for Godot

Donald Trump and Waiting for Justice

By Robin Bates | Published: March 30, 2023

For years we have been awaiting for our own Godot, which is to say, justice for Trump. Perhaps Godot has finally shown up.

Posted in Uncategorized | Also tagged justice for all, Samuel Beckett, Trump indictment | Comments closed

Alas, Poor Twitter–I Knew Him, Ho-Ratio

By Robin Bates | Published: October 30, 2022

Literary allusions have been flying, many with a sense of doom, since Elon Musk purchased Twitter.

Posted in Uncategorized | Also tagged Elon Musk, Hamlet, Henry VI Part 2, Jane Austen, Mansfield Park, Pride and Prejudice, Samuel Beckett, Sense and Sensibility, twitter, William Shakespeare | Comments closed

Waiting for Godot–or Gopot

By Robin Bates | Published: May 23, 2021

Democrats waiting for bipartisan compromise is like waiting for Godot.

Posted in Uncategorized | Also tagged congressional investigation of Jan 6, GOP, infrastructure bill, Kevin McCarthy, Samuel Beckett | Comments closed

Are We Watching Shakespeare or Beckett?

By Robin Bates | Published: March 7, 2019

Friday When assuring my English majors that they will find jobs in the world beyond college, I sometimes point out that they are experts in narrative. Increasingly we are learning how much we process reality through stories, and political operatives talk ceaselessly about “controlling the narrative.” How you organize facts (or for that matter, lies) […]

Posted in Uncategorized | Also tagged Arthur Conan Doyle, Donald Trump, Endgame, Hamlet, King Lear, Macbeth, Mueller investigation, narrative, Richard III, Samuel Beckett, Unnamable, Westword Ho!, William Shakespeare | Comments closed

Imagine Lit Characters in Reality TV

By Robin Bates | Published: January 24, 2019

Thursday I came across this enjoyable tweet from one Ross Danniel Bullen, who imagines a Victorian version of the House Hunters television show: Host: I— Henry James: I should like a kitchen whose concept is – how shall I conceive of it – not closed, not in some way occluded, but bright, agape, unrestrained as […]

Posted in Uncategorized | Also tagged Bachelor, Bachelorette, Charles Dickens, Hard Times, Henry James, House Hunters, Importance of Being Earnest, Jane Austen, Jeopardy, Lost, Oscar Wilde, Pride and Prejudice, reality television, Samuel Beckett, television shows | Comments closed

Lit As a Framework for Exploring Death

By Robin Bates | Published: January 9, 2017

Paul Kalinithi turned to existential writers as he attempted to understand the fact that he was dying. He arrived at a more spiritual understanding than he anticipated.

Posted in Uncategorized | Also tagged Baron Brook Fulke Greville, death and dying, Krapp's Last Tape, Paul Kalinithi, Samuel Beckett, T. S. Eliot, Waste Land | Comments closed

Waiting for Biden, Paul Ryan, & Reagan

By Robin Bates | Published: October 19, 2015

Some Democrats are waiting for Joe Biden and many Republicans are awaiting the reincarnation of Ronald Reagan. Samuel Beckett foresaw in all in “Waiting for Godot.”

Posted in Uncategorized | Also tagged Democrats, Freedom Caucus, GOP, Joe Biden, Paul Ryan, politics, Republicans, Samuel Beckett | Comments closed

Awaiting Godot in the Age of Cable News

By Robin Bates | Published: May 5, 2014

Stephen Colbert realizes that only Beckett’s theater of the absurd will do justice to breathless media coverage of the latest crisis (whatever it is).

Posted in Uncategorized | Also tagged CNN, Malaysian Flight 370, Samuel Beckett, Stephen Colbert, theater of the absurd | Comments closed