"But it is quite hopeless." - Selected Works Vol. II, 286
When not reading Beckett in my copious
amount of free time, I try to occupy my mind with other things. Whenever I
happen to have a mind much like Zuccotti Park after evacuation day, I always
seem to be focused on the same thought time and time again, “Help me god. I am
going to die.” I’m not going to lie, it’s a scary one that has caused me a lot
of trouble at the expense of radical decisions made from desperate affirmations
in defiance of existential ennui. However, it’s usually (no, no, it is always) all in
vain.
But while reading The Unnamable, I was given a break from this demoralizing thought,
while being confronted with someone (or something else) battling the exact same
idea (or so it seemed that way). I found hope, if I should call it that, in
the hopeless, and a sense of bliss instilled in me while watching “the
Unnamable” unravel like I am so prone to do.
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| My mind, whilst unoccupied. |
It was nice and a little relieving to
watch the narrator struggle with the same things I do:
“Mean words, and
needless, from the mean old spirit, I invented love, music, the smell of
flowering currant, to escape from me. Organs, a without, it’s easy to imagine,
a god, it’s unavoidable, you imagine them, it’s easy, the worst is dulled, you
doze away, an instant. Yes, God, fomenter of calm, I never believed, not a
second” (299).
I touched on this slightly before in my
post about Belacqua and the arts, but the best way to distract yourself from
mortality is to occupy your mind, and the narrator seems to reassert this
belief. The incessant need to escape oneself, to divert your thought
to allow a few moments of tranquility while ignoring your temporary condition
in an insignificant sphere of existence. It gets tiring, and sometimes, at
least for me, it’s easy to pass off your ignoring onto something tangible, like
a God, to calm yourself, to believe in
an inherent meaning. It makes life easier. But then again, as is always the
case, I come back not to believe. Now I wouldn’t call myself an atheist, and I’m
really not an agnostic, it’s hard to explain anyway so I’ll spare you the
rhetoric.
The “Unnamable,” hits me again: “I, of
whom I know nothing, I know my eyes are open, because of the tears that pour
from them unceasingly” (298). While constantly confronting the impossible
thought of an eternity of nothingness, it can overwhelm us with fear, and a
sense of sadness. It’s not easy to accept, no, it never is, and some might
suggest that we just ignore it all together, but no, no, I must go on.
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| It's always near. |
Well, like I said, this post is very
personal and I’ll selfishly use it in a casual tone because to be honest, it is
nice. Venting every now and then publicly never hurt anyone…(irony). But,
anyway, in the middle of the linguistic whirlwind that The Unnamable is, I find somewhere among the silence a sense of
extreme hope:
“No, they have
nothing to fear, I am walled round with their vociferations none will ever
know what I am, none will ever hear me say it, I won’t say it, I can’t say it,
I have no language but theirs, no, perhaps I’ll say it, even with their
language, for me alone, so as not to have not lived in vain, and so as to go
silent, if that is what confers the right to silence, and it’s unlikely, it’s
they who have silence in their gift, they who decide, the same old gang, among
themselves, no matter, to with silence, I’ll say what I am, so as not to have
not been born for nothing” (319).
Even while confronting our inescapably current existence, our death, and how those before us have come to define
everything and manipulate our current sect of thinking, the Unnamable goes on
in defiance, in revolt. Even though
it’s all in vain, it’s nice to try and defy that. Anyway, I’m not sure if I've said much, other than, “I’m afraid to die, Beckett made me not think of that
for a little bit,” and, “I like the defiance of the Unnamable to keep on going.”
After all, he “can’t go on, I’ll go on” (407).
This song both has everything and nothing to do with what I've just written about. Listen to it. Enjoy it.
Kilian,
ReplyDeleteYour title really gripped me, and please don't worry about adding a personal touch to literature. In my opinion, reading literature is a very personal experience. I really enjoyed your personal take on Beckett. I can see where you are coming from with this middle ground between agnostic and athiest. Also, just an editing note, you italicized, quoted, and bolded The Unnamable differently throughout the blog. Other than that, you are set; you have great opinions and views that would make a great class discussion.
-Marla
Your post (or perhaps just the mention of ennui) reminds me of the stereotypical (but mostly true) existentialist belief that the majority of our lives are spent finding ways to preoccupy ourselves so that we may avoid the fact of our own deaths until the very last moment. It's a very personal view that inevitably evokes one's own experience, and I wouldn't be surprised if Beckett--with all his dark humor and taste for tedium--is expressing something similar in his works.
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