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Lessness
Hardcover with unclipped dust jacket, in good condition. Jacket is marked and foxed throughout. Edges are creased and nicked. Board corners and spine ends are bumped and marked. Page block is tanned, with spots of foxing on the pastedowns and endpapers. Boards are clean, binding is sound and pages are clear. LW
21 pages, Hardcover
First published January 1, 1969
3 people are currently reading
73 people want to read
About the author
Samuel Beckett
915 books6,547 followersNovels of Samuel Barclay Beckett, Irish writer, include
Murphy
in 1938 and
Malone Dies
in 1951; a wider audience know his absurdist plays, such as
Waiting for Godot
in 1952 and
Krapp's Last Tape
in 1959, and he won the Nobel Prize of 1969 for literature.
Samuel Barclay Beckett, an avant-garde theater director and poet, lived in France for most of his adult life. He used English and French. His work offers a bleak, tragicomic outlook on human nature, often coupled with black gallows humor.
People regard most influence of Samuel Barclay Beckett of the 20th century. James Augustine Aloysius Joyce strongly influenced him, whom people consider as one modernist. People sometimes consider him as an inspiration to many later first postmodernists. He is one of the key in what Martin Esslin called the "theater of the absurd". His later career worked with increasing minimalism.
People awarded Samuel Barclay Beckett "for his writing, which—in new forms for the novel and drama—in the destitution of modern man acquires its elevation".
In 1984, people elected Samuel Barclay Bennett as Saoi of Aosdána.
Samuel Barclay Beckett, an avant-garde theater director and poet, lived in France for most of his adult life. He used English and French. His work offers a bleak, tragicomic outlook on human nature, often coupled with black gallows humor.
People regard most influence of Samuel Barclay Beckett of the 20th century. James Augustine Aloysius Joyce strongly influenced him, whom people consider as one modernist. People sometimes consider him as an inspiration to many later first postmodernists. He is one of the key in what Martin Esslin called the "theater of the absurd". His later career worked with increasing minimalism.
People awarded Samuel Barclay Beckett "for his writing, which—in new forms for the novel and drama—in the destitution of modern man acquires its elevation".
In 1984, people elected Samuel Barclay Bennett as Saoi of Aosdána.
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Displaying 1 - 11 of 11 reviews
May 15, 2018
Ma, čak malo i izaziva znatiželju, ali nedovoljno.
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January 18, 2023(Part of my current project of reading everything Beckett published in precise chronological order.)
In the copy for the book jacket of Lessness, Beckett wrote that the work was concerned with "the collapse of some such refuge as that last attempted in Ping and with the ensuing situation of the refugee". Thus, it's plausible to think of Lessness as a kind of sequel to Ping, and so as belonging to the series of prose pieces that Beckett produced in the immediately preceding period, including All Strange Away and Imagination Dead Imagine. Where the figures in Imagination Dead Imagine and Ping are enclosed in a container without hope of escape, the 'little body' of Lessness escapes its enclosure: its walls collapse and it falls backward onto the ground.
Where it finds itself is an endless landscape domed by an infinite sky, both the same ashen grey. and dotted with planar white ruins. However, whereas Ping is a narrative of absolute bleakness, absolute deprivation, in Lessness the world into which the figure is ejected is sublime, even beautiful, and there are intimations of something like hope for the 'little body'. When on its back, it gazes at the sky, as if contemplating the limitlessness of being. Over and over again, it gets up and takes a step, only to find itself unable to keep on its feet, and falling down on its back again. But this isn't quite the surreal slapstick distinctive of earlier Beckett. The figure is unperturbed by its many failures. Instead, it imagines and dreams. It has been freed from its prison, as well as freed from the delusion that the pristine isolation of that prison was actually a refuge.
In the copy for the book jacket of Lessness, Beckett wrote that the work was concerned with "the collapse of some such refuge as that last attempted in Ping and with the ensuing situation of the refugee". Thus, it's plausible to think of Lessness as a kind of sequel to Ping, and so as belonging to the series of prose pieces that Beckett produced in the immediately preceding period, including All Strange Away and Imagination Dead Imagine. Where the figures in Imagination Dead Imagine and Ping are enclosed in a container without hope of escape, the 'little body' of Lessness escapes its enclosure: its walls collapse and it falls backward onto the ground.
Where it finds itself is an endless landscape domed by an infinite sky, both the same ashen grey. and dotted with planar white ruins. However, whereas Ping is a narrative of absolute bleakness, absolute deprivation, in Lessness the world into which the figure is ejected is sublime, even beautiful, and there are intimations of something like hope for the 'little body'. When on its back, it gazes at the sky, as if contemplating the limitlessness of being. Over and over again, it gets up and takes a step, only to find itself unable to keep on its feet, and falling down on its back again. But this isn't quite the surreal slapstick distinctive of earlier Beckett. The figure is unperturbed by its many failures. Instead, it imagines and dreams. It has been freed from its prison, as well as freed from the delusion that the pristine isolation of that prison was actually a refuge.
August 9, 2020
Best understood as an experiment in words and images when sequences or repeated can create a sense of narrative action and corresponding gestures.
I kept imagining I was hearing the thoughts of a young child as he lay on his back with his head inside a four walled white room, glancing within and outside of the space.
- all sides endlessness earth sky as one no sound no stir...
I kept imagining I was hearing the thoughts of a young child as he lay on his back with his head inside a four walled white room, glancing within and outside of the space.
- all sides endlessness earth sky as one no sound no stir...
November 30, 2021
Fucking beautiful book. less: no.
April 26, 2023
fairly perfect little ditty
March 18, 2016
Абсурден.
***
In the sand no hold one step more in the endlessness he will make it. It will be day and night again over him the endlessness the air heart will beat again.
***
On him will rain again as in the blessed days of blue the passing cloud.
***
He will live again the space of a step it will be day and night again over him the endlessness. Face to white calm touch close eye calm long last all gone from mind.
***
He will go on his back face to the sky open again over him the ruins the sand the endlessness. (...) Blank planes touch close sheer white all gone from mind.
***
Heart beating little body only upright grey face features overrun two pale blue. Only upright little body grey smooth no relief a few holes. Never but dream the days and nights made of dreams of other nights better days. He will stir in the sand there will be stir in the sky the air the sand. One step in the ruins in the sand on his back in the endlessness he will make it. Never but silence such that in imagination this wild laughter these cries.
***
Never but imagined the blue in a wild imagining the blue celeste of poesy. Light white touch close head through calm eye light of reason all gone from mind.
***
One step more one alone all alone in the sand no hold he will make it. Ash grey little body only upright heart beating face to endlessness.
***
In the sand no hold one step more in the endlessness he will make it. It will be day and night again over him the endlessness the air heart will beat again.
***
On him will rain again as in the blessed days of blue the passing cloud.
***
He will live again the space of a step it will be day and night again over him the endlessness. Face to white calm touch close eye calm long last all gone from mind.
***
He will go on his back face to the sky open again over him the ruins the sand the endlessness. (...) Blank planes touch close sheer white all gone from mind.
***
Heart beating little body only upright grey face features overrun two pale blue. Only upright little body grey smooth no relief a few holes. Never but dream the days and nights made of dreams of other nights better days. He will stir in the sand there will be stir in the sky the air the sand. One step in the ruins in the sand on his back in the endlessness he will make it. Never but silence such that in imagination this wild laughter these cries.
***
Never but imagined the blue in a wild imagining the blue celeste of poesy. Light white touch close head through calm eye light of reason all gone from mind.
***
One step more one alone all alone in the sand no hold he will make it. Ash grey little body only upright heart beating face to endlessness.
July 16, 2017
I'm not sure I quite understood but there are strong feelings with this one (of anxiety mostly).
January 2, 2015
A rather intriguing book, though very short. Reading it feels as if it should be read out loud, or performed, as the words seem to have a rhythm to them.
November 5, 2016
little body grey...
July 9, 2015
Interesting and odd.
Displaying 1 - 11 of 11 reviews