Perpetual
Flux and Unchanging Singularity: The Ideas of Heraclitus and Parmenides in
William Faulkner’s The Sound and the Fury and Samuel Beckett’s Waiting
for Godot
Part two of a forthcoming book called Collected Essays: Volume Two.
The pre-Socratic philosophers are
often seen as the start of western philosophy and knowledge. Thinkers like
Heraclitus and Parmenides preceded Jesus Christ by some five-hundred years. They
looked at ontological and metaphysical issues, which we still think about today.
Indeed, Heraclitus’ ideas on change have been compared with Einstein’s discoveries
in relativity (Kim 2017, p. 28). Heraclitus emphasised how things always
change. Additionally, he had aphoristic insights on ‘the logos’ and as to how we have
to use our reason. Although he
spoke about fire being the causal factor of everything, which might make him seem
like a unitarian, he wrote about clashing opposites and how they create change.
Meanwhile, Parmenides claimed that everything that we see has to come out of
something and that something cannot come out of nothing. This led him to the
extreme view that nothing changes at all and that we live in a continuous
present and he thought that there was no creation and no end to the world. This
essay will use these ideas in dealing with close readings of two seminal modernist texts –
the novel The Sound and the Fury by William Faulkner (1929) and the play
Waiting for Godot (1953) by Samuel Beckett. Faulkner used stream of consciousness
and interior monologues and his novel covers many points in time and space.
Everything is in a constant state of flux and, like many other examples of stream
of consciousness, he makes associations between many different things. As such,
this essay will compare the novel with Heraclitus’ views on the perpetual flux
and it will compare the novel with Heraclitus’ views on the Logos and clashing opposites.
On the other hand, Waiting for Godot is situated in the same point in space.
The characters joke as to how immobile they are and how so little happens. This essay will apply ideas on ‘what-is’ and the ‘unchanging
singularity’ to close readings of the play.
This essay will start
by looking at Heraclitus’ views on the underlying unity of the world, which he
called ‘the Logos.’ The ‘Logos’ is a multifarious term which was used by many
philosophers from ancient Greece and it was integral to Heraclitus’ philosophy.
For Heraclitus, it was a principle that created the whole of reality. According
to the Logos, there is harmony in the world and there is an underlying rational
principle which explains the natural world (Waterfield 2000, p. 32). There is
an underlying unity to things and it is divine (p. 33). The whole world is
intelligent and alive, it speaks to the wise man and it communicates itself to
wise sages like Heraclitus (p. 32). The truth, for Heraclitus, is only
accessible through divine understanding; that is, an understanding which exists
beyond the natural world (p. 33). Humans live as if they are asleep and they
are not aware of it and, although they are not aware of it, the Logos is
accessible to everyone, but we fail to see it (p. 33). Indeed, Heraclitus
states the following in one of his remaining fragments: ‘Things keep their
secrets’ (2003, p. 9). The Logos, the truth of all things, is universally
apprehensible (p. 33). The appreciation of things is like the underlying
harmony; it requires reflection, not just naïve reliance on the senses (p. 33).
As such, Heraclitus casts doubt on the senses and their ability to explain the
natural world (p. 33). The data supplied by the senses requires judicious
assessment (p. 33). However, Heraclitus places more emphasis on introspection
than wide learning and disparages thinkers like Pythagoras for this (p. 33).
This
essay will now examine how the characters perceive the underlying nature of
things in the final third person chapter, the chapter narrated by Benjy and Quentin.
The final chapter takes place in a church, it is narrated in third person and
it is preceded by three viscerally subjective chapters. God might possibly be
the closest thing in their society to the Greek Logos, as God is meant to be an
omnipresent entity who overlooks all of nature and is only accessible via
divine understanding. The church also creates bonds of community amongst the
Afro-American and white communities: ‘Thinks he ain’t good enough fer white
church, but nigger church ain’t good enough fer him’ (Faulkner 1929, p. 246).
The church creates these bonds, but its followers also try to access a divine
order. They go to a space where they can come into contact with a divine entity
which controls outcomes: ‘Serene, tortured crucifix that transcended its
shabbiness and insignificance. (…) Yes, Jesus!’ (Faulkner, 249). Also, the
material world is imperfect, as the crucifix ‘transcends’ its ‘shabbiness,’
which suggests that the raw materials fail to approximate its grands
significance. Additionally, Heraclitus claimed that we are sleepers who need to
wake up and use our reason. This is similar to a lot of Christian rhetoric, as
many preachers talk about being ‘awakened,’ ‘redemption’ and ‘born again’: ‘O
sinner? I see de resurrection en de light. […] Ye shall live again’ (p. 252). Heraclitus’
awakening involved the use of reason whereas this kind of Christian language is
very emotive. Heraclitus was an elitist whilst the characters in this church, and
many of Faulkner’s writings, are illiterate and poorly educated. Indeed, the
first chapter of the novel is narrated by Benjy who is mentally challenged.
Benjy cannot speak, read or write. As such, he relies on his senses and does
not use his reason to observe the world. Interestingly, he is also obsessed
with fire, one of the central aspects of Heraclitus’ thought.
The
main component of Heraclitus’ thought is the idea of the ‘perpetual flux.’
Although he spoke about the world having an underlying harmony, Heraclitus
stressed the flux of things rather than their stability (Waterfield, p. 33).
Everything is in a constant state of flux, which is why he opposed unitarians
such as Parmenides (p. 34). There is an underlying unity, which he calls the
Logos, but this underlying unity occurs at a deeper level (p. 34). On the
surface, everything is changing all the time. He has a famous metaphor about a
river and how you can never step into it twice: ‘The river where you set your
foot just now is gone – those waters giving way to this, now this’ (Heraclitus
2003, p. 27). He states the following in another fragment: ‘Just as the river
where I step is not the same, and is, so I am as am not’ (p. 51). Dying and
living things are a single continuum and they are all relative to each other
(p. 34). Although Heraclitus speaks about a physical flux, he also speaks about
an epistemic flux (p. 34). That is, everything changes in the natural world,
but the world of knowledge is also always in a state of perpetual motion. Although
Heraclitus claimed that everything was always changing, we needed to use our
reason, wake up from our sleeping state and look at the underlying unity of
things (p. 34). Like other pre-Socratic philosophers, Heraclitus claimed that
there was one element that caused everything in the natural world and for
Heraclitus this fire was this element. For Thales, possibly the earliest
pre-Socratic philosopher, water was the primary element. Everything is in a
state of perpetual flux, but fire, the casual factor of everything, always
stays the same, partly because it preserves life through warmth (p. 34). He
also thought that it was a divine property from the heavens (p. 34).
The
first two chapters in The Sound and the Fury jump across large periods
in space and time. As such, they are similar to Heraclitus’ ‘perpetual flux.’ The
first chapter is centred around Benjy, who has severe learning difficulties.
Benjy’s mind jumps across several different points in time, presumably due to
his mental condition. The font changes from roman numerals to italics so as to
signal this, which is jarring for the reader. Additionally, Faulkner makes no
attempt to contextualise each episode and this makes things more difficult for
the reader. Heraclitus spoke about a physical flux and an epistemic flux, but
this chapter is primarily comprised of a mental flux. Everything is indeed in a
constant state of flux, but this does not occur in a linear way. Time
constantly jumps backwards and forwards in time and different memories are usually
ignited by certain feelings. A memory usually appears when he sees a particular
object or smells something. For instance, he thinks of his sister Caddy when he
sees a fence, as he used to spend time with her there: ‘We went along the fence
and came to the garden fence, where our shadows were. […] We came to the broken
place and went through it’ (p. 2). This reminds him of his sister Caddy: ‘Caddy
uncaught me and we crawled through’ (p. 2). He once more thinks of his sister
Caddy when his hands get frozen. Once this happens, time shifts to a peculiar
sentence: ‘Caddy smelled like trees’ (p. 4). This section is also similar to
Heraclitus’ fragment about not being able to step in the same river twice, as
memories are constantly being revisited and they acquire new resonances each
time Benjy experiences something new. On another occasion, a black character
called T. P. talks about the fence: ‘You can’t do no good, moaning and
slobbering through the fence’ (p. 42). This instigates a memory of his father
talking about the gate: ‘How did you get out, father said. Did you leave the
gate when you came in, Jason’ (p. 42). T. P. is also a figure of authority and
he jumbles him up with his father, another figure of authority. Similarly, he
thinks that he might see his sister Caddy when he sees a group of girls near
the fence. Caddy has left the house years ago, but he thinks that she might be
with them, even though she would have aged since then: ‘“I’m scared to cross
the street.” “He can’t get out.” They came on. I opened the gate and stopped.
[…] They were going up the hill where it fell away.’ Of course, as Heraclitus
claimed, time always changes, but Benjy does not grasp this due to his
condition.
Having
examined Benjy’s section, this essay will now examine how Heraclitus’ ideas on
the perpetual flux come through in Quentin’s section. By contrast, Quentin is a
highly literate and educated character, but his section also includes
fragmented, cryptic and idiosyncratic language. Faulkner attempts to recreate
his mental breakdown, so he uses stream of consciousness, run-on sentences and
unpunctuated sentences. Everything is indeed changing Quentin’s mind; it is
once again a mental flux. Interestingly, he has ruminations on the nature of
time: ‘An apotheosis in which a temporary state of mind will become symmetrical
above the flesh and aware of both itself’ (Faulkner, p. 150). Similarly, he
also writes: ‘Natural events and their causes which shadows every mans brow even
Benjys and you not thinking of finitude you are contemplating…’ (p. 150). Here
he writes about natural events and how time progresses differently for
different people. There are natural laws and there is a universal clock, but
humans often perceive this through a subjective prism. Certain moments seem to
an ‘apotheosis’ and seem to stand apart from other perhaps more mundane
moments. Benjy often fixates on certain memories to the detriment of others,
for example. Faulkner uses stream of consciousness and the continuous
unpunctuated sentences try to capture the way that we think. Indeed, we do not
often think in paragraphs and grammatically correct sentences. We also
associate different things together. Maurice Ebeleen writes that stream of
consciousness lays bare the inner thoughts of characters and stops them from
evading unpleasant truths: ‘Stream of consciousness narrative mode evacuates authoritative
narration who may meditate, mediate and re-envision the characters’ experiences
from a privileged position’ (2014). Indeed, Quentin thinks about different points
in time and juxtaposes them within a single protracted sentence: ‘Let us sell
Benjy’s pasture so that Quentin may go to Harvard, and I may knock my bones to
go together’ (p. 147). Time also encapsulates everything. He quotes his father
when he first gives him his watch: ‘I give you the mausoleum of all hope and
desire. […] gain the reducto absurdum of all human experience’ (p. 63).
Everyone lives within a universal clock, but time can also be mental and
subjective, which led to Immanuel Kant claiming that the perception of time is
a priori, as it precedes experience (Janiak 2016). Although the perception of
time is mental and subjective, everyone it experiences it together, which is
what Quentin’s father calls ‘all human experience.’ This is a universal clock,
but Quentin’s father emphasises how it is perceived in a particular way by an
individual: ‘fit your individual needs no better than it fitted his or her
father’s’ (p. 63). However, although there is such a thing as objective time,
the subjective memory is selective as to what it remembers: ‘I give it to you
not that you may remember time, but that you might forget it’ (p. 63). Time is
always changing in an endless perpetual flux, but it is possible for the
subjective mind to wander off and detach itself from it: ‘I don’t suppose
anybody ever deliberately listens to a watch or a clock. You don’t have to. You
can be oblivious to the sound for a long while, then in a second of blinking it
can create in the mind unbroken the long diminished time you didn’t hear’ (p.
63). Indeed, time is always changing, but subjective perception is not always
in harmony with it. Time is a priori and mental, as Kant would have it, but the
perception of time is still intelligible to all of us and he calls this ‘the
transcendental apperception’ (Janiak). Additionally, the subjective perception
of time is different every time. Moments in the universal clock can feel
shorter or longer depending on the individual, which refies the dynamic nature
of time. Indeed, this is in keeping with Heraclitus’ view that you can never
step into the same river twice: ‘I suppose it takes at least one hour to lose
time in, who has been longer than history getting into the mechanical
progression of it’ (p. 69). Quentin’s mind is indeed also in a perpetual flux
and the deteriorating syntax represents his fragile mental state. Interestingly,
Maurice Ebileen writes that Faulkner’s use of stream of consciousness is
reminiscent of psychosis (2014). Unlike Benjy, he looks at the underlying
nature of things – what Heraclitus would call the Logos – and has ruminations
on the nature of time, which are in some cases similar to Heraclitus’
philosophy.
Finally, the other
central component of Heraclitus’ thought is the idea of opposites. Heraclitus
thought that clashing opposites caused the perpetual flux, but these opposites
were heterogenous and they were commensurable with each other. This was also
consistent with the idea of fire being the causal factor of everything, since
although it preserves warmth it can also be highly destructive (Waterfield, p.
34). Opposites tend to go in different directions, but they are essential to
each other. Indeed, he states the following: ‘From the strain of binding
opposites comes harmony’ (Heraclitus 2003, p. 46). He uses the bow as a
metaphor for this idea: ‘The cosmos works by harmony and tensions, like the
lyre and bow’ (2003, p. 37). This tension might also suggest that there is an
underlying order and unity in the world beneath the perpetual flux (p. 34). Indeed,
many of Heraclitus’ arguments are consistent with this idea of clashing
opposites. These opposites include perpetual flux/hidden stability, war/peace,
strife/harmony and sleepers/enlightened rationalists (p. 37).
The Sound and the Fury is similar to
this, as it includes three sections which are narrated by very different
characters. Quentin, Benjy and Jason have very different temperaments and
writing styles. They have clashed with each other because they are family, but
they are interdependent despite this conflict. Indeed, Stancey Burton writes
the following: ‘All three authors in the novel complement each other in various
ways’ (2001, p. 610). In Benjy’s case, his sense of time is skewed due to his
mental condition, but his use of language is also highly idiosyncratic and
defamiliarizing. Idiosyncratic means that there is a habit that is peculiar to
that person whilst defamiliarization involves presenting normal things in a
strange way. Benjy cannot even speak let alone write, but Faulkner deliberately
writes in this idiosyncratic way so as to capture his way of thinking. He
speaks about his sister smelling like trees and he later describes smelling the
cold: ‘I could smell the cold flapping’ (p. 10). Benjy’s use of language is
peculiar, as he does not know how to even differentiate between smells,
particular objects or climates. It is peculiar to claim to ‘smell the cold’ or
for his sister Caddy ‘to smell like trees.’ It is defamiliarizing, as it takes
things we already know and presents them in an unusual way. Additionally, the
reader might not be entirely familiar with Benjy’s condition when he starts
reading this section of the book. Indeed, the reader is immediately confronted
with very unusual language in the first chapter: ‘I could see them hitting.
They were coming toward where the flag was and I went along the fence. Luster
was hunting in the grass by the flower tree. They took the flag out, and they
went to the table, and he hit and the other hit. Then they went on, and I went
along the fence’ (p. 1). Benjy is describing golfing, but he does not know what
golfing is, or its terminology, due to his mental condition. Once more, the
language is idiosyncratic and defamiliarizing. The writing style is quite
episodic, detached and fragmented, which once more emphasises his limited
cognitive abilities.
This
essay will examine Quentin’s use of language and his temperament and consider
how he is the opposite of Benjy. Quentin, by contrast, is quite philosophical: ‘The
field only reveals to man his own folly and despair, and victory is an illusion
of philosophers and fools’ (p. 63). He also writes about ‘constant speculation’
(p. 64). Benjy recounts surface level emotion and he uses peculiar language.
Benjy has not even been socialised and does not have the cognitive ability so
as to speak, learn, read or think. Quentin, meanwhile, offers philosophical ruminations
on ontology and the nature of time. Benjy’s writing is episodic; he writes in a
fragmented way. He writes in the following way: ‘and then… and then…’ However,
Quentin’s style is more fluid, but his style becomes more fragmented and detached
once his mental health deteriorates. His lexical choices are much more
sophisticated and he uses complicated metaphors: ‘reducto absurdum’ (p. 63), ‘impervious
shadow’ (p. 80), ‘affinity for evil’ (p. 80), ‘ubiquitous and garrulous’ (p. 81).
However, his style becomes increasingly idiosyncratic as his mental health
deteriorates: ‘Watching pennies more stars than Jews’ (p. 151). The later
sections of this chapter have no punctuation, have run-on sentences and
different ideas are enmeshed within the same sentence. Quentin is introspective
and he is a Harvard student whilst Benjy is ‘an idiot full of sound and fury.’
Both chapters use stream of consciousness and interior monologues and reveal
the interiority of the characters, but they portray different people. They are brothers
and they are obsessed with their sister Caddy. As Heraclitus noted, opposites
clash with each other, but they complement each other and develop each other.
Both characters grew up together and had a formative influence on their
character.
The
third chapter in the book is devoted to the character Jason. He is unpleasant
and vitriolic by temperament and his use of language is colloquial and steeped
in the vernacular of southern USA. Benjy and Quentin often use idiosyncratic
language, such as ‘I saw them hitting’ and ‘Caddy smelled like trees.’ By contrast,
Quentin uses more refined language, but it becomes more idiosyncratic. However,
Jason has clearly been more socialised and his use of language reflects his local
culture. Benjy has not been socialised at all due to his cognitive impairment
whilst Quentin is more literary, bookish, lexically richer and detached from
his local culture. Jason uses colloquialisms and he uses racist and sexist
language which reflects prevalent social attitudes. He speaks in a sexist way about
his daughter Quentin [no relation to his brother]: ‘Once a bitch, always a
bitch’ (p. 153). He speaks thusly about blacks: ‘Six niggers that can’t even
stand.’ (p. 153). He speaks in the vernacular of his local culture: ‘Well, I says’
(p. 153). He is aggressive by temperament, he chases his daughter throughout
this chapter and he is prone to losing his temper: ‘You’ll lose your temper with
her’ (p. 153). Heraclitus said that opposites are ‘like the lyre and the bow’
and that they depend on each other to make them function. Benjy, Quentin and
Jason are all brothers, but they have all shaped each other in varying ways due
to their upbringing.
Meanwhile,
Parmenides is often seen as being the polar opposite of Heraclitus, since he
claimed that things did not change at all. His philosophy started with the
premise that anything that we can think about either ‘is or is not’
(Waterfield, p. 50). Indeed, it is often claimed that Parmenides’ philosophy is
the first attempt at ontology (Sedley 1998), the study of being and existence.
Parmenides makes a distinction between ‘what is’ and ‘what-is-not.’ ‘What is’
is something that exists and something that we can predicate things onto (p.
50). Thinking and being are interchangeable and co-extensive; we only think
about things that exist, we do not think of things that do not exist (p. 51).
However, we can clearly think of things that do not exist and Waterfield offers
the examples of unicorns and the king of Australia (p. 51). Indeed, Parmenides
says the following in the eponymous Platonic dialogue Parmenides: ‘For
that which is said “not to be” is known to be something all the same, and is
distinguished from other things’ (Plato 2015, p. 80). This means that connotations
only emerge out of things that we recognise and that we cannot think of an
‘attributeless entity’ (p. 51). We can either say that ‘X is…’ or ‘X is not…’
and the ellipses are filled with different predicates. We cannot identify
‘being’ and ‘not-being’ precisely because the predicates are often different; a
thing either ‘is’ or ‘is not.’ (p. 52). Parmenides emphasises that something
cannot come to existence out of nothing (p. 52). ‘What-is-not’ has no
properties, so we cannot explain how it can generate the properties of
‘what-is’ (p. 52). ‘What-is-must be’ appears to be deduced from ‘what-is can
be’ (p. 52). These two propositions are identical, since there can never be
anything other than ‘what can be’ (p. 52). Hence, ‘what-is’ is an unchanging entity,
as ‘what-is’ cannot come out of nothing.
It
is possible to find similarities between Parmenides’ philosophy and Waiting
for Godot by Samuel Beckett. The characters in the play really do exist. For
instance, Vladimir says the following about Estragon: ‘I’m glad to see you
back. I thought you had gone forever’ (p. 9). Estragon clearly is
something and he clearly does exist. Anything that exists, according to Parmenides,
either is or is not and we can predicate things onto it. Thinking and being
might be identical and we can clearly think about something that does exist. In
the context of the play, Estragon is clearly there: ‘I’m glad to see you’ (p. 9).
The surroundings, however, are artificial and it is unclear if they are really
there: ‘“A ditch? Where?” (Without gesture) “Over there.”’ We can speak about something
if it has certain attributes and we cannot speak about an attributeless entity.
Estragon speaks about sleeping in a ditch without specifying where the ditch is.
According to Waterfield, we can think of a unicorn or a king of Australia in
our minds, but they have no basis in reality. A ditch does have a basis in
reality, but Estragon does not show us where this ditch is. Parmenides says that
something must come out of something and that something cannot come into being
out of something that does not exist. ‘What-is-not’ has no properties, so it
cannot generate ‘what-is.’ The ditch cannot exist if we cannot find the point in
space where it belongs. Otherwise, like a unicorn, it is just a product of the
imagination. The surroundings seem to be artificial and Godot himself seems to
be artificial: ‘“You took me for Godot. […] “Who is he?” “Oh, he’s a… kind of
acquaintance.” “Nothing of the kind, we hardly know him. […] Personally, I
wouldn’t even know him if I saw him’ (p. 23). Vladimir hesitates when he speaks
about Godot and his language is evasive, which suggests that he is making it up.
He is ‘a kind of acquaintance’ and this is preceded by ellipses, which suggests
that he is unsure as to what he is talking about. Later on, they attempt to predicate
attributes onto Godot: ‘“What does he do, Mr. Godot?” “He does nothing, sir.” “Has
a beard, Mr. Godot.” “I think it’s white, sir’ (p. 92). According to Parmenides,
X either is… or is… not and the ellipses are filled with different predicates. They
attempt to impute different characteristics onto Godot, but they attempt to do
so with an entity that does not exist, so it is therefore talking about a product
of the mind.
Additionally,
the play also deals with religion, which raises further ontological questions: ‘“Did
you ever read the bible?” “Do you remember the gospels?” “I remember the maps
of the Holy Land’ (p. 21). The character that they wait for, Godot, never
arrives. Hence, it is not clear whether he even exists and whether he has any
properties. Godot is like much religion; he is not of this world. Many critics
have recognised that the play has religious resonances (Amin 2019). We cannot
speak about the properties of something if we do not know what generated these
properties. Similarly, the ‘Holy Land’ is something supernatural and it is not
of this world. It is something that we talk about and it is something that we
can attribute things to, but it is not something that we can empirically verify;
it is something supernatural. Similarly, Godot never appears and he is only
talked about, so, like much religion, it is unclear whether he exists.
Parmenides
line of reasoning led him to claim that ‘what-is’ – everything that we see – is
unborn, imperishable, entire, unique and unchanging, which he calls ‘an
unchanging singularity’ (p. 52). Thus, Parmenides repudiated all of his
predecessors who tried to explain phenomena with claims about creation and change
and he posed a challenge to philosophers who came after him (p. 53). Creation
must take place either from ‘what-is’ or from ‘what-is-not.’ According to
Parmenides, ‘what-is’ exists in an unbroken continuum, starting from the
infinite past and into the infinite future. Additionally, all parts of reality
are part of a greater whole. Parmenides states the following in one of Plato’s
dialogues: ‘Every part is part of a whole’ (Plato 2015, p. 40). He also says
the following: ‘Parts, as we affirm, have a relation to the whole’ (p. 75). As
such, he claimed that there can be no creation in the past or future (p. 53).
However, ‘what-is’ is not imperishable, as the same arguments eliminate
perishing (p. 53). ‘What-is’ is an unchanging singularity and it is continuous
in space and time and all kinds of change are not possible (p. 53). ‘What-is’
is also complete, perfect and spherical, which would lead certain people to
wonder what lies beyond the sphere (p. 54). He uses the metaphor of the sphere
because a sphere is the same in every direction that you look at it, both from
the inside and the outside (p. 54). Finally, Parmenides also has more of a
theological bent than Heraclitus. A goddess claims that the unchanging
singularity is an epistemological truth (p. 54). Mortals make the mistake of
following the world of the senses, but there is only the world of the
unchanging singularity, which is the world of reason rather than the senses (p.
55). This is similar to Heraclitus, as he claimed that the Logos was the world
of reason and that it required the use of reason rather than the senses to
understand it.
The
characters in Waiting for Godot seem to be stuck in a state of stasis.
Time does not seem to pass; there is no past, present or future. At one point,
the characters interact thusly: “That passed the time.” “It would have passed
in any case.” “Yes, but not so rapidly” (p. 94). The characters joke as to how
they are stuck in the same predicament – they are always together, waiting for
Godot. Indeed, they mention that they never change: ‘“Very likely. They all
change. Only we can’t’ (p. 48). They often emphasise how immobile they are and
how they cannot move: ‘“Let’s go.” “We can’t.” “Why not?” “We’re waiting for
Godot” (p. 48). Their purpose, and the purpose of the play, is to wait for
Godot. So much so that they cannot move and they are always stuck in the same
point in space. The characters themselves seem to become interchangeable and it
is difficult to differentiate them: ‘“We know them. […] Unless they’re not the
same’ (p. 48). The sphere in Parmenides philosophy is always the same every way
that you look at it. In the play, they are always talking about the same thing
and they are always talking about waiting for Godot. If Godot exists, he exists
outside the sphere. All change in Parmenides is eliminated and, indeed, very little
change occurs throughout the play. Indeed, the play ends with the same shtick: ‘“Come
back tomorrow?” “Yes.” (p. 93)’ They always carry on. Godot seems to be their
salvation, even if they carry on with the same repetitive routine: ‘“We’ll hang
ourselves tomorrow. Unless Godot comes.” “And if he comes.” “We’ll be saved”
(p. 93). Indeed, the description of Act II reifies this: ‘Next day. Same time.
Same place’ (p. 55). Nothing changes; all of the characters meet in the same
place and time with the same purpose.
Heraclitus
claimed that most people are in a state of sleep and cannot use their reason to
see the underlying nature of things, which he called ‘the Logos,’ which is divine.
The final chapter takes place in a church, the closest contemporaneous
equivalent of ‘the Logos,’ as the characters attempt to reach a divine understanding.
The character Benjy relies on his senses and he cognitively impaired whilst his
brother Quentin, a Harvard graduate, uses his reason so as to understand the nature
of things. Everything constantly changes in Faulkner’s novel. In the first
chapter, time constantly shifts back and forth in time and this is due to Benjy’s
condition. It is a mental, not physical, flux. The shifts in time are usually triggered
due to certain feelings. Meanwhile, Quentin’s chapter also jumps about in time
and his mental health deteriorates. He also has philosophical ruminations on
the nature of time and as to how individuals perceive time differently from a ‘universal
clock.’ This essay also examined Heraclitus’ ideas on the nature of opposites
and how they complement each other. The three principal characters in the novel
– Benjy, Quentin and Jason – are opposites who complement each other. Benjy writes
in a peculiar way due to his condition whilst Quentin writes in a more
sophisticated and literary way. Jason, meanwhile, writes in a way that reflects
the local vernacular. Their personalities are all drastically different as
well, but they have all developed each other in varying ways, which is in line
with Heraclitus’ views on opposites. Waiting for Godot is similar to Parmenides
thought, as the play does not change very much. The surroundings seem artificial
and the characters ponder whether they exist or not. They talk about things
which have no basis in reality, which is similar to Parmenides’ thought on ‘what-is’
and ‘what-is-not.’ The play has some ideas on religion and the supernatural,
which is not of this world and outside ‘the sphere.’ Parmenides wrote as to how
things need to come out of something, they cannot come out of nothing. The
characters speak about things that do not seem to be real, such as Godot. Finally,
the play is like ‘the unchanging singularity’ which Parmenides wrote about, as
they always meet in the same place and they always wait for Godot. These are
the aspects of Heraclitus’ and Parmenides thought which this essay has
identified in The Sound and the Fury by William Faulkner and Waiting
for Godot by Samuel Beckett.
Works Cited
Beckett, Samuel. (1978) Waiting for
Godot. Originally published in 1956. London: Faber.
Burton, Stacey.
(2001) ‘Rereading Faulkner: Authority, Criticism and The Sound and the Fury.’
In Modern Philology. 48: 4.
Ebileen,
Maurice. (2014) ‘Benjy’s Howl: Farom Symptom to Sinthome in William Faulkner’s The
Sound and the Fury.’ In Figures in the Lacanian Field. 12:1.
Faulkner, William.
(1995) The Sound and the Fury. Originally published in 1929. London:
Vintage.
Heraclitus.
(2003) Fragments. Translated by Brooks Haxton. London: Penguin.
Kim,
Yung. (2017) New Genesis: Hyperspace Revelations.
Plato. (2008) Parmenides.
Translated by Benjamin Jowett. Mississippi: Gutenberg E-book.
Sedley,
David. (1990) ‘Parmenides’ in Routledge Encyclopaedia of Philosophy. Ed.
Edward Craig. New York: Routledge.
Waterfield, Robin.
(2000). The First Philosophers: The Pre-Socratics and the Sophists. Oxford:
Oxford University Press.
Yamin, Momen Yaseen M. (2019) Symbolic Analysis of
Waiting for Godot: A Critical Comparison Between the Bible and Quran Symbols in
Waiting for Godot. In Studies in Literature and Language. 19: 3.
