Subtitled ''A tragicomedy in two Acts'', and famously described by the Irish critic Vivien Mercier as a play in which ''nothing happens, twice'', En attendant Godot was first performed at the Théâtre de Babylone in Paris in 1953. It was translated into English by Samuel Beckett, and Waiting for Godot opened at the Arts Theatre in London in 1955.

''Go and see Waiting for Godot. At the worst you will discover a curiosity, a four-leaved clover, a black tulip; at the best something that will securely lodge in a corner of your mind for as long as you live.'' Harold Hobson, 7 August 1955

''I told him that if by Godot I had meant God I would have said God, and not Godot. This seemed to disappoint him greatly.'' Samuel Beckett, 1955