Sunday, February 21, 2010

Truth vs Fiction

Throughout the three novels by Samuel Beckett he is constantly reminding his readers that this is just a story and not truth. Five instances of this are:
1) pg 35 "The house where Lousse lived. Must I describe it? I don't think so. I won't, that's all I know, for the moment. Perhaps later on, if I get to know it." Here he is pulling the reader out of the story by saying that he is not going to describe it right now, but maybe later.
2) pg 52 "But instead of trying to satisfy this wish I stayed where I was looking at it, if I may say so, looking at it as it shrivelled up and finally disappeared, like the famous fatal skin, only much quicker." Here he is letting the reader know that this is something that is being written by saying 'If I may say so'.
3) pg 61 "And backsliding has always depressed me, but life seems made up of backsliding, and death itself must be a kind of backsliding, i wouldn't be surprised. Did I say the wind had fallen? A fine rain falling, somehow that seems to exclude all idea of wind." Here is is pulling the reader out of the story by 'forgetting' what he had written and then asking the reader "Did I say...?"
4) pg 91 "I had forgotten them. I saw the sheep again. Or so I say now." In this section he is basically telling the reader that he is fibbing about what he is writing in this story.
5) pg 13 "he didn't seem to be in a hurry, he was loitering, I've already said so, but after three minutes of me he is in a hurry, he has to hurry." Beckett is bringing himself into the story again as the writer by saying 'I have already said this'. This pulls the reader out of the story and reminds them that this was written as a story.

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