This Happy Days has nothing to do with Henry Winkler or Ron Howard. Nope, this is Samuel Beckett in full Samuel Beckett style. Rather than go through the long list identifying all the things this play shares in common with Beckett's other works, I'm going to continue my effort to get beyond all Beckett's baggage and find something different, or at least something that maybe isn't so obvious.
Winnie is a wife suffering from depression and denial and maybe a little bit of self hate. Given that perspective, we can also reinterpret some of the symbols in the play.
So why do I say Winnie is a depressed wife in denial? Let's start with page 31, where Winnie talks about "something something laughing wild amid severest woe." This is a quote from Thomas Gray's "Ode on a Distant Prospect of Eton College" from a list of things that try men including, "moody Madness laughing wild amid severest woe." Sounds like depression and denial to me.
Immediately after she asks Willy (the presumed husband, and God knows what else he would be to still be with her in the miserable state in which they live), "Was I loveable once?" Winnie believes she is not (and perhaps never was) lovable, meaning she is unloved (even by herself). If that isn't obvious enough, consider a few lines further where she says, "I am not asking you if you loved me, we know all about that, I am asking you if you found me lovable." She has given up on Willie loving her. She believes he stays with her out of force of habit, or because it is "the right thing to do" or some other such thing. We're not sure what she's looking for from him, but she apparently isn't getting what she considers to be love from him. If that isn't enough to make a wife depressed, what is?
On page 34, after another attempt to find something to shore up her self esteem and failing, she says, "Forgive me, Willie, sorrow keeps breaking in. Ah well, what a joy in any case to know you are there..." She says, in effect, "I'm horrifically sad… but I'll keep telling myself I'm happy because you're there," even though she's already admitted that she doesn't think he loves her. Maybe she's happy because he is staying with her and she is making him as miserable (she believes) as she is.
Another indication of Winnie's outlook is on page 41 where she refers to the people who stopped to look at her speculating that they were married, then saying, "no – they are holding hands – his fiancée more likely – or just some – loved one." Winnie is suggesting that, if they had been married, they wouldn't have been holding hands, would have abandoned the intimacy and love that unmarried couples share.
In a very Beckettian statement, Winnie says on page 42, "Ah well, I supposed it's only natural. Human. What is one to do?" Now, we might suppose that this is Winnie referring to Willie's indelicate action in the preceding lines, but given the stage direction "Break in voice" in the midst of this statement, this is more likely to be a commentary on something bigger. Winnie is saying that there is nothing to be done about being human. Humanity drags one down. To use a line from Beckett's Endgame, "We're on earth – there's no cure for that."
Winnie addresses her problem in the same the way many depressed housewives addressed their problem in the 1960s. On page 13-14, Winnie pulls out a medicine bottle and reads that it is for "loss of spirits" among other things and offers, "instantaneous improvement". She proceeds to drink the remaining contents of the almost empty bottle. The immediate response, "Ah that's better!" Ironically, the medicine is red. The term "reds" is 1960s drug slang for depressants.
So, Winnie is depressed. She's also in denial. Throughout the play she is trying to pretend she's happy as evidenced in some of the quotes above – telling herself she's happy because Willie is there, for example. She forces smiles. She constantly tells herself it will be a "happy day" even though she is far from happy. This is clear denial.
Let's use this thinking to look at some of the symbolism in the play. Willie spends most of the play behind the mound and seems, if not unresponsive to Winnie, certainly distracted by other things. One example, a postcard that Winnie finds scandalous (page 19). Perhaps Willie is using pornography in place of his wife. This also offers a different possible vision of Willie's offensive behavior on page 42. It's also probably worth noting that his name is a common British slang term for a penis, further suggesting his particular distraction. The mound that first encases Winnie to her chest and finally to her neck is an image of the depression slowly eating her. Eventually, she'll be completely buried, unable to breathe. The bell that tells her when to wake and sleep and Winnie's mechanical behavior suggest the ways a depressed person may force themselves to appear functional for as long as they can, mechanically making their way through the day, killing time until they can go to sleep when they can at least not be aware of how miserable they feel.
Thus we have Winnie, depressed 1960s wife, denying her depression and putting on a brave face as the steadily growing heap of misery consumes her.
Of course, this phenomenon isn't restricted to the 1960s. Today we have Prozac (and cousins) in place of older antidepressants, a wider acceptance of depression as a psychological condition instead of "crazy", and so forth, but it seems safe to say that Winnie still roams the wilderness of the world, probably many more Winnie's than many people suspect.
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