Endgame Response
Conventions
The conventions of this play revolve around the playwright's desire to reject the conventions of classic storytelling. Exposition? There is a deliberate ambiguity. The relationship between Clov and Hamm is never clearly established. We do know that Nagg and Nell are Hamm's father and mother respectively. Where are they? The word shelter' is used twice in the play but the only thing that is certain is that this is a room with two windows that overlook a corpsed' grey' world. Beginning, middle, and end? Not in this plot. In fact, there is no clearly established plot. Many students had wonderful comments about the relationships and emotions in the play but spent most of their time focusing on their confusion. In many instance, this is because we are taught to search for 'something going on' These characters have replaced meaningful activity with memory, banter, and a kind of dreary routine that fills up an endless amount of time.
Other conventions would be the severe restrictions that the characters have on their physical world. The absence of the 'outside,' as well as the severe disabilities, and seemingly limited resources of food and medicine further limit their activities and make the characters dependent on each other.
Another interesting convention is the style of the language. The give and take in the dialogue is often disjointed. The timing of these lines is everything. Believe it or not, Beckett wanted this dialogue to sound like the routine of two comedians. While there is a severe tone to the play, there are moments of levity (such as some basic comic skits like the moving of the ladder in an ineffectual manner or the appearance of the dog that is brought onstage).
Plot
Rather than a traditional plot, the play is comprised of routines that the characters to use to fill up their day. At the end of the play, however, there seems to...
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