"I know folks who laid side by side for years and never knew that they were stranded."
Just sit right back and you'll hear a tale... a tale of one of the greatest songs you've never heard.
(Yet.)
Vance Gilbert's "Waiting for Gilligan" -- not exactly a household name or a jukebox mainstay. But no matter; the song is brimming with literary allusions, and it's friggin' brilliant, to boot.
A quick summary:
The weather started getting rough and the eponymous star of the famed 1960s TV series ended up shipwrecked on a desert island with Ginger, Marianne and the rest. Familiar story, right? Right.
.... but what about the love he left behind?
Gilligan: Oh snap!Suddenly, we've got ourselves a new twist on an old classic: it's the same basic Gilligan narrative we all know and love, but this time, it's told through the eyes of the girl that our hero left back on the shore. Even though all hope seems lost, Gil's gal ("Gal-ligan?") keeps a "lonely vigil" day in and day out, watching the waves and staring off at the horizon in a desperate hope that her man will indeed find his way back home to her.
It almost seems like she's been doing this forever.
People call her crazy. An entire generation has come of age on her watch. And she has no sign or reassurance that the waiting will ever pay off in the end (after all, "the short-wave [radio] has been broken down for years"). But still -- and perhaps even in spite of herself -- this gal can't help but cross her fingers "with every ship that makes the trip back home."
After all -- she's doing the only thing she knows how to do: "I'm waiting for Gilligan."
Equally humorous and heartbreaking, ya' know? Why it's almost absurd. Here's an excerpt of an interview with old Vance himself in which he practically says as much:
"[People] can laugh at the top, I don't care because there is a lot more song to go at that point. But then there is a line "If faith and hope were made of gold I would wear that crown because I'm waiting for Gilligan." [And] suddenly that's not funny anymore. Like, this is a real definition of somebody waiting and pondering love and its just not going to be funny then."So lemme' get this straight...
We've got a narrator who's wholly determined but totally stranded and helpless to change their situation, yes? And they're waiting for somebody to arrive in spite of the fact that all reliable signs tell them that such an effort is completely in vain?
Yup, definitely read this one before:
Waiting for Godot (1949)- Samuel Beckett
Beckett's "tragi-comedy" pretty much defined the literary movement which would come to be known as the "Theatre of the Absurd." What's "Theatre of the Absurd," you ask? Simply stated: plays in which there's a whole buncha' stuff happening, but there's with no real meaning to connect it all. It doesn't have to make sense. Things just -- happen. People don't get what they earn or get what they deserve: they simply get what they get.
Here's the five-second recap of Wating for Godot:
Two regular guys (Vladimir and Estragon -- or Didi and Gogo, for short) waste an afternoon in conversation while waiting for this fella' named Godot. They don't quite know *why* they're waiting, of course, or *if* he'll even show up in the first place (they did the same thing just yesterday, as a matter of fact, and he was nowhere to be found) -- but still, they keep their daily vigil all the same. Because if Godot doesn't quite manage to make it out to find them today, and if he didn't quite manage to make it out to find them yesterday, well then surely this means he'll arrive all the sooner tomorrow, right?
Ha.
Is it "commitment," or is it "crazy?" Humorous? Or heartbreaking? Heck -- some might even say it's (wait for it...) "absurd." And intermittently throughout the play, Didi and Gogo occassionally seem to catch on to this fact:
Estragon: Let's go.Vladimir: We can't.Estragon: Why not?Vladimir: We're waiting for Godot.Estragon: (despairingly) Ah!Its almost seems like they've been doing this forever (hey wait a second...)
But in spite of themselves, the duo is resolved: they will do today what they did yesterday, and then do it all over again tomorrow, if they have to.
After all -- they're doing the only thing they know how to do: "We're waiting for Godot."
(I'll give you two guesses on how *that* one turns out...)
Corky St. Clair: I can't put up with you people: because you're BASTARD people!Ahh, but that's a story for another day. Tell you what: let's leave it here for now, and why don't we pick right up where we left off tomorrow, yes?
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(... see what I did there?)
*PS: If you're reading this entry anywhere outside of the original blog location, click here and you can listen to the song, too :)
