Suhamy, Ariel. "Samuel Beckett in History." LA VIE DES IDEES November 13, 2008.

Temkine, Pierre, ed. Warten auf Godot: Das Absurde und die Geschichte. Trans. Tim Trzaskalik. Berlin: Matthes and Seitz, 2008. A book on Samuel Beckett’s famous play, Waiting for Godot, is causing quite a stir beyond the Rhine, and further: even the Danish press mentions it. Nothing is known in France of this commotion, despite the fact that the book is translated from the French – it hasn’t found a publisher here. Why? Is it because its authors are not university-spawned? Or because the position they defend is unbearable? Indeed, according to Pierre and Valentin Temkine, Waiting for Godot is not the play we thought it was. The famous collection Les Ecrivains de toujours once summed up the play in these terms: “Vladimir and Estragon, two puppets stranded in the limbo of a no man’s land where everything repeats itself – lingering words, gestures of tenderness or aversion, clowning around meant to elude suffering, visits from humanity […] – persist in expecting the unlikely rescue from an outside or a great beyond which leaves them to their own devices, trapped within their questions in the here and now” (Ludovic Janvier, Beckett par lui-même, Seuil, 1969). It’s the same song and dance in a recent theatre programme: “In a bit of countryside, on a slow evening, two tramps await a certain Godot [...] What are Vladimir and Estragon, this pair of bewildered jokers, harping on about?” (Compagnie Kick Theatre, Theatrical Centre of Guyancourt, 2007, quoted in the book by François Rastier). From the time of the premiere, a critic had set the tone: “Godot, in an indefinite past, in rather uncertain circumstances, set them a rather imprecise appointment in an ill-defined place at an indeterminate time”. Valentin Temkine’s comment is: “One couldn’t be more systematically mistaken!” Repetition, no man’s land, clowning, all these categories that constitute what by common accord is called “absurdist theatre” are energetically dispatched by Temkine. Quite conversely, the play has a place, a time and its characters have a well-defined identity. The plot is set in the Roussillon region of southern France (where Beckett resided during the war), at the time of the invasion of the free zone, and the two characters Vladimir and Estragon are Jews who are waiting for the smuggler who is to save them: some Godot. In 1942, there would have been no reason for them to leave Roussillon. By 1944, they would already have been deported. The play is therefore set in the Spring of 1943 precisely. . . . Read the rest here: http://www.laviedesidees.fr/Samuel-Beckett-in-history.html.