The Caretaker was by far my least favorite among the 4 plays we had to read during IB2. It was absurd enough to be considered absurdist nor was it realistic enough to be considered a problem play. Compared to The Bald Soprano, Ionesco's fun and inventive play, Beckett has chosen a dull approach to express his existantialist point of view. First of all, the stage instructions were frustrating and hard to follow which made it difficult for me to imagine the play in my mind. Whenever I read a play or a novel, I try to establish a personal connection with one of the characters. However, I found that I could not relate to the characters on any level. For example, I could not sympathize with Davies, the protagonist of the play. He may be old, homeless and unemployed but he acts like an arrogant prick with Aston and Mick, who on the other hand could not have been more welcoming towards a total stranger. In addition, the plot is stagnant and the dialogue between the characters often chunky and not very engaging. There were few times when I found the dialogue slightly comic, like when Davies complains about his shoes, but for the most part I thought it wasn't funny.
I am not sure that I understood the motifs scattered throughout the play. The Buddha appears several times but to no avail. Also, the idea that Aston wants to build a shack and that Davies wants to get his papers from the coffeehouse are so frustratingly redundant that it can be annoying to the reader. I know that repetition is a characteristic of absurdist plays but I do not think that Beckett integrated them very smoothly. I am trying to think of a single aspect that I enjoyed. Oh, yes! I did like the fact that it wasn't very wordy (e.g. Hamlet). Reading it did take me a very long time despite that, perhaps due to my lack of interest. I do not think that it deserves the recognition that it has received for the simple reason that it does not outsmart other plays and definitely isn't more entertaining than other plays that belong to the same genre. I feel bad for being so harsh but that's exactly how I feel about it.
1 comment:
At the time The Caretaker war written, England was still in ruins and trying to recover from the davastation and destruction which was left after WW2. With that in mind, it is easier to see why the audiance at that time might have found the play to be more interesting and amusing. During that time, the audiance could have related much more easily with the characters since they were dealing with many of the same things.
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