Q1. Discuss the significance of physical disability in the play.
Q2. Is the ending of the play a message of hope or despair?
Q3. Discuss the father/son relationship between Nagg and Hamm? How are they dependent on each other?
Q4. Discuss the significance of the colour grey in the play.
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I think there is a huge significance to the colour grey in the play. I think that the set and the coulor grey can be used to also look at the other questions. The time of day and colour represents a kind of indeterminancy of will, and in the sense of Hamm a paralysis of will. He aims to stay in his own world, exactly in the centre of the room and even when clov moves him to see the sun, which is not out, but imagines he can feel, Hamm still wishes to go to that same centre spot in the room. He is paralyzed physically and in the cyclical grey world he lives in. Grey also connects the idea of dispair in the play. There seems to be not much hope for Hamm because he is so conflicted. He says, "i can't go on, I will go on." In other words, he wants death to come, but he is contantly hesitating "to finish." the irony is that he can't accept death so ultimately he is stuck in the clylical grey world where his mind lives. The play is just a repeating of events. the part where they talk about the "grains" forming a heap is particularly intersting because it shows that life is just moment after moment and eventually they form a heap before you are aware. for these characters the moments are a constant repitition, showing a confusion of how these characters view life and time. the heap seems to be again a metaphore for the indeterminate and uncertain life. There is constant routine, repition, they go no where, and sadly the characters seem end exactly where they began. Hamm is isolated by his self pity and the grey in his life and similarly clov feels as if he as "lost the light," when he talks about staring at the wall in the kitchen.I feel like beckett leaves the story hanging because thats exactly his point to show the indetirminancy of life. these characters are never really connected and perhaps they wish to be, like when Hamm asks for a kiss, but clov refuses. The character are trapped and although it seems like they could go somewhere, they don't even know how. The grey and scene they live in seems to show the perpetual cycle of their life, where the beginning is exactly the same as the end, and there is never any closer and hardly any light.
Hamms disability to see and move enables the net of dependency between the characters of the play.
For example, though Hamm has managed to make his parents dependent on him for maintainance, he still needs Nagg as a listener to his story because he has no other friends or relations except for Glov and his parents, he is thus dependent on Nagg whom he even has to bribe.
The ending contains mainly a message of despair as Hamm and his parents continue living their miserable lives in monotony, however there may be a note of hope for Glov as he might manage to free himself of Hamm and live his own life.
I very much like Lucy's discussion of the colour grey and the connection she draws to the other discussion topics, I have nothing to add to it here.
See u in class
Of course it’s significant to note that the only character in the play not suffering from some form of physical disability is Clov, the servant figure. But ironically it’s Clov’s physical ability that ties him to the service of the other characters. Until the end of the play, Clov’s existence is defined by his employers: he is “socially” disabled until he realizes the futility of prolonging Hamm’s, and by extension Hamm’s parents, decrepit existence.
One interesting line, however, that may point to a further significance of Clov’s unique physical ableness, occurs within a speech of Hamm’s. While reminiscing about the possibility of his own death, Hamm describes “[having] called my father and I'll have called my... (he hesitates)...my son. And even twice, or three times, in case they shouldn't have heard me, the first time, or the second. (Pause.) I'll say to myself, He'll come back.”
This line leaves open the possibility that Clov is, in fact, Hamm’s son. The fact that Hamm refers to him in the context of being called but having possibly left for good is at least directly parallel, if not an actual reference, to Clov’s dilemma (to leave or remain) throughout the play. Even if the reference is only a parallel, however, it still points to Clov as a son-like figure.
Therefore, Clov’s physical ability, along with Hamm’s confinement to his chair and Nagg and Nell’s complete helplessness, contributes to the portrayal of the inevitable advance of time and age. One generation is totally debilitated, the next is quickly decaying and possibly on the brink of death, and the third, though capable enough in and of itself, must decide whether it will remain bound to the other two or if it will abandon its “filial duty”, so to speak. Clov, in his lack of disability, represents the role of youth in the decay of age.
-Katherine K. (my screename is nothing like my real name)
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