Endgame

by

Samuel Beckett

Nell Character Analysis

Along with her husband, Nagg, Nell lost her legs in a tandem bike-riding accident many years ago. She now lives in a trashcan that sits next to Hamm’s chair. When she pokes her head out of the bin, she talks to Nagg, indulging him by trying to kiss him even though she knows they won’t be able to reach each other from their separate trashcans. When Nagg laughs at their son, Hamm, because he’s miserable, Nell tells him not to laugh at such things, though she goes on to assert that unhappiness is the funniest thing in the world. Still, though, she says it’s not worth laughing at suffering because such misery is like an old joke—it’s still funny, but one need not actually laugh at it. Like the other characters in Endgame, Nell is displeased with her circumstances and sees her everyday life as a “farce,” but she also approaches this with a sense of acceptance. It is perhaps for this reason that she is the only one to escape life’s misery by dying—after Nagg goes back into his trashcan, Nell falls into a kind of delirium state and Clov declares that she has no pulse before shutting her inside her trashcan. In this way, Nell is the only person in the entire play to experience an ending, though her death hardly affects Hamm and Clov, who barely register her passing, though Nagg—for his part—descends into his trashcan and weeps for the remainder of the play after she dies.

Nell Quotes in Endgame

The Endgame quotes below are all either spoken by Nell or refer to Nell. For each quote, you can also see the other characters and themes related to it (each theme is indicated by its own dot and icon, like this one:
Meaning, Narrative, and Engagement Theme Icon
).
Endgame Quotes

CLOV: [fixed gaze, tonelessly] Finished, it’s finished, nearly finished, it must be nearly finished.

[Pause.]

Grain upon grain, one by one, and one day, suddenly, there’s a heap, a little heap, the impossible heap.

Related Characters: Clov (speaker), Hamm, Nagg, Nell
Page Number: 8
Explanation and Analysis:

NELL: Yes, yes, it’s the most comical thing in the world. And we laugh, we laugh, with a will, in the beginning. But it’s always the same thing. Yes, it’s like the funny story we have heard too often, we still find it funny, but we don’t laugh any more.

Related Characters: Nell (speaker), Hamm, Nagg
Page Number: 26
Explanation and Analysis:
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Nell Quotes in Endgame

The Endgame quotes below are all either spoken by Nell or refer to Nell. For each quote, you can also see the other characters and themes related to it (each theme is indicated by its own dot and icon, like this one:
Meaning, Narrative, and Engagement Theme Icon
).
Endgame Quotes

CLOV: [fixed gaze, tonelessly] Finished, it’s finished, nearly finished, it must be nearly finished.

[Pause.]

Grain upon grain, one by one, and one day, suddenly, there’s a heap, a little heap, the impossible heap.

Related Characters: Clov (speaker), Hamm, Nagg, Nell
Page Number: 8
Explanation and Analysis:

NELL: Yes, yes, it’s the most comical thing in the world. And we laugh, we laugh, with a will, in the beginning. But it’s always the same thing. Yes, it’s like the funny story we have heard too often, we still find it funny, but we don’t laugh any more.

Related Characters: Nell (speaker), Hamm, Nagg
Page Number: 26
Explanation and Analysis: