MOTIV BOGALjA I NjEGOVE REINTERPRETACIJE OD BEKETOVOG NEIMENLjIVOG DO KOMEDIJE (1953–1963) U SVETLU FORMALNOG NAUKA RASINOVE BERENIKE

Abstract

The Beckett’s critique accepts that the evolution of his fictional trilogy can be summarized by the dichotomy ‘motion vs. immobility’, whose three stages – wandering, confinement to bed and fixity – follow the succession of the trilogy’s imaginary spaces. Malon Dies (1951) is the end of wandering, The Unnamable (1953) is the ultimate stage of immobilization, with the legless Mahood sunk to the neck into a decorative pot, and being used as a landmark by the passers-by. According to Alain Badiou – one of the pioneers of Beckett’s critique renewal in France in the 1990s – one should not see the tragic pathos of human destiny in this scene but an orchestration of methodological asceticism which, following Descartes and Husserl’s model, allows the authors to experiment while isolating one of the humankind’s essential functions: to go, to be, to say (and the Other, from How It Is (1961) on). The philosopher then divides the first function into two phases – motion and rest. In this study, we relate this last point to the infirm figure and its reinterpretation in Beckett’s novels and plays from 1953 to 1963. The recurrence and variation of this figure serve the exploration of formal possibilities, mostly based on the opposition made by Badiou between to go and to say, as well as on the radicalization of Racine’s principles included in Berenice’s preface. The effects of this double motion on The Unnamable will be expressed by the notorious metatextual observation: “[W]ords, they’re all I have”. The critics only recently discovered the impact of Berenice on Beckett, following the publication of the author’s biography by Noulson and according to which, in 1956, Beckett was already concentrating on the possibilities given by the monologue thanks to this tragedy – a source of inspiration for the plays Happy Days and Play. We claim that the influence of Berenice is already decisive in The Unnamable. Even though the influence of Racine on this corpus has been perceptible for a long time, its importance is only recently being confirmed; which opens new paths for research.