Darkness is a constant theme, often used in the sparse conversation of the text.  Mother Pegg died not of disease or ailment, but of darkness.  Hamm refused to give her oil for lamp, thus keeping her in darkness. The irony now is Hamm is blind and is now in darkness.  Hamm and Clov live as in a hole in the world, a world that’s grey and the light is fading, continually fading.  Their room is also grey. 

            Light and darkness signify their personal existence, or lack of meaningful existence.  At the beginning Clov is upset that “light is dying”.  But self-centered
Hamm feels sorry for himself and shifts attention to his light, which he thinks is worse.  “Take at look at me and then come back and tell me what you think of your light.” p.12

            Later in the text, Hamm seems to be waiting on night, as he has Clov look out the windows, and wonders out loud if night has fallen, staying that the sun should be sinking. 
       Hamm recounts a narrative that has a poor beggar come to him begging for bread for his child.  The darkening begins at this point.  He remarks that it was a “glorious bright day”, but already the sun was sinking down into the …down among the dead”. p. 51.  He later admits that at this point he does not think he will be in the world much longer.

            Nagg then talks about Hamm’s childhood.  When Hamm was a child and frightened of the dark, he wanted comfort from his father.  But Nagg says that Hamm the child did not really want him to listen, and his hope is that Hamm will cry out of the darkness and really want him to listen, and he will “be his only hope”.

            After talking about happiness,
Hamm suddenly wants to feel the light on his face.  He has Clov take him to the window, but there is no light. 
          Hamm cries out for the darkness to come, which is the end.  “Let it end! with a bang! of darkness” p. 77.  And in his poem at the end he cries for night, for a chance to cry in darkness.

            In the “game” of Clov and Hamm’s interdependence, there is no meaning in their existence, no sincerity in the acts.  They live to die.  Clov stares at the wall, in other words, he fills his life with insignificant and less than meaningful acts.  He is passive, a fatalist and an “unauthentic” person.  He wants order so much, that he refuses to make his own choices and spends his days following orders of
Hamm.  Conversely, Hamm has to be center, but he only sees the world through Clov’s eyes.  Both avoid their own personal existence through their interdependent relationship.  Clov objects several times to the “game”.  He does not want to look out of the glass when he looks out the window at the world.  But Hamm always insists.  Clov always obeys, however he does so grudgingly.  When Clov refuses to play any longer, Hamm just puts his handkerchief over his eyes, his “old stancher”.  To stanch is to stop the flow of blood.  His handkerchief stops the bleeding, or life, returning him to his dreams of forests, where he can make love, go into the woods, run, and see the sky. (p. 8). 

            Their evolution from living their life to waiting for death with days filled with meaningless, insignificant acts and relationships is expressed in the darkness metaphor.  The importance is shown in the repetition of the metaphor in this minimalist language of Beckett.  I’m sure there are plenty of deeper meaning for darkness in this text and look forward to reading other ideas.