POZZO
Why doesn't he answer when I call?
VLADIMIR
I don't know. He seems to be sleeping. Perhaps he's dead.
[…]
VLADIMIR
Make sure he's alive before you start. No point in exerting yourself if he's dead. (2.715-35)
Vladimir is unable to take death seriously, leading us to believe that his earlier humanistic concern for Lucky’s welfare was just his impression of what he thought a person would do.
Quote 35
POZZO
(suddenly furious) Have you not done tormenting me with your accursed time! It's abominable! When! When! One day, is that not enough for you, one day he went dumb, one day I went blind, one day we'll go deaf, one day we were born, one day we shall die, the same day, the same second, is that not enough for you? (Calmer.) They give birth astride of a grave, the light gleams an instant, then it's night once more. (He jerks the rope.) On! (2.773)
Pozzo’s view of death seems disturbingly extreme, but he’s actually not telling us anything we don’t know. Death, he says, is inevitable. When a person is born, he begins his fall toward the grave. The only difference between his statement and what is perhaps a more common view of death is the amount of time that passes between birth and death. In our case, a lifetime, in this image, the moment it takes to drop into the ground. However, Waiting for Godot has already shown us that time is arbitrary (think about the conversation in Act 1 when Vladimir and Estragon try to determine what day it is). If this is true, the difference between an instant and a lifetime is simply a matter of perspective.