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Happiness
When a word is in a title you know it's a Big Deal. On the outset, we might think Happy Days is going to be a happy play about happy people in a happy land. Okay, maybe not that nauseatingly pleasant, but you get the drift. Yet, as soon as the play opens we find our lead characters stuck in an apocalyptic environment, which gives us our first real clue about the play—it's irony at its best. So, what exactly is Beckett trying to say about happiness? How does it relate to us? After all, happiness is all but expected in the USA—it's even in The Declaration of Independence. Happy Days forces us to question whether happiness is something that is so easily attainable, or if it's simply an illusion, something we choose to believe in because we are scared of the alternative.
Winnie and Willie are not happy "in the present"—they derive their happiness from the past or from material objects that distract them.
Winnie preserves her sense of "happiness" through ignorance and routine.
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