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Disjecta: Miscellaneous Writings and a Dramatic Fragment
“[Beckett] is a serious writer with something serious to say about the human condition: and therefore one of the dozen or so writers those who are concerned with modern man in search of his soul should read.”—Stephen Spender, The New York Times
Renowned Beckett scholar Ruby Cohn has selected some of Beckett's criticisms, reviews, letters, and other unpublished materials that shed new light on his work.
Renowned Beckett scholar Ruby Cohn has selected some of Beckett's criticisms, reviews, letters, and other unpublished materials that shed new light on his work.
176 pages, Paperback
First published October 1, 1983
8 people are currently reading
120 people want to read
About the author
Samuel Beckett
914 books6,545 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 - 10 of 10 reviews
July 29, 2020
Of all the authors I have read, I find Beckett to be the most challenging by far. In much the same way as reading textbooks and scholarly works (meaning books meant to teach first and foremost and not to entertain or take one's mind off the day or transport you to another world/time/perspective), reading Beckett forces you to pay full attention to every single word. You can't skim Beckett, or if you do, then you are not reading Beckett at all, for by skipping or eliding or jumping ahead you miss the point. The words, the cadences, the repetitions, the minimalism, the circularity, the now-ness. Beckett demands your attention and immersion, or maybe he just expects it. Why else read? Why words? Why? I won't get into over-reviewing each specific text in any Beckett book as I find that defeatist, or maybe beyond my ken. Often it’s merely words on the page given meaning by how the reader interprets/intuits/internalizes them. I say Beckett is unequaled, unmatched, unsurpassed, but that is just one opinion. Still, I say read him, often, and again…
So, genius.
I was unsure what to expect from Beckett’s essays, letters, and other various non-fiction pieces. Besides any of the references to his works, or other references to (possibly known) works by other writers, I found this book rather dense and academic-leaning. That is not a bad thing, but it should be noted, as what and who he writes about/to are not necessarily household names, books, or topics of general interest.
His hoax lecture describing the life and influence of a fake poet is untranslated, which is odd, and annoying, and I spent more time than I would like to admit using Google Translate to get the text to English from its original French. A foolhardy endeavor, for sure, but a fun read. Probably more of an “inside joke” against academia at the time.
Again with the translating! A German Letter of 1937, in German, no less! Initially unsure I should care, but I translated it anyway. Interesting as a document, but too specific for the details to mean anything to me, a layperson.
Les Deux Besoins (The Two Needs). Yep, again, in French. Essay referring to artists and needs, and their interrelationship and circularity. A bit over-complex but thoroughly Beckettian in its wording.
The remaining essays are about the works of other writers, poets, and painters. Again, not necessarily spellbinding if the subject of the essay is unknown or uninteresting to the reader, but I read these just to get glimpses into the brilliantly critical mind of a writer I have untold respect for, regardless of the topic. I won’t lie and say I absorbed all, or even most, of the essays. Suffice it to say Beckett is amazingly well-suited to criticism.
The play fragment - Human Wishes - is just Beckett being Beckett. My respect for his stage work means I can read his plays, even in part, and still swoon over the skill he brings to bear.
In summary, this book is likely more for the Beckett Completist, or the Beckett Academic, as it is mostly non-fiction and hardly utilizes popular culture referents for its topics. I tend toward the former, having read nearly all of his works, so I enjoyed this immensely, if not always grasping the finer details of some of the writings presented.
Not a book to start your Beckett adventures, but one you will get to as a matter of course because Beckett.
So, genius.
I was unsure what to expect from Beckett’s essays, letters, and other various non-fiction pieces. Besides any of the references to his works, or other references to (possibly known) works by other writers, I found this book rather dense and academic-leaning. That is not a bad thing, but it should be noted, as what and who he writes about/to are not necessarily household names, books, or topics of general interest.
His hoax lecture describing the life and influence of a fake poet is untranslated, which is odd, and annoying, and I spent more time than I would like to admit using Google Translate to get the text to English from its original French. A foolhardy endeavor, for sure, but a fun read. Probably more of an “inside joke” against academia at the time.
Again with the translating! A German Letter of 1937, in German, no less! Initially unsure I should care, but I translated it anyway. Interesting as a document, but too specific for the details to mean anything to me, a layperson.
Les Deux Besoins (The Two Needs). Yep, again, in French. Essay referring to artists and needs, and their interrelationship and circularity. A bit over-complex but thoroughly Beckettian in its wording.
The remaining essays are about the works of other writers, poets, and painters. Again, not necessarily spellbinding if the subject of the essay is unknown or uninteresting to the reader, but I read these just to get glimpses into the brilliantly critical mind of a writer I have untold respect for, regardless of the topic. I won’t lie and say I absorbed all, or even most, of the essays. Suffice it to say Beckett is amazingly well-suited to criticism.
The play fragment - Human Wishes - is just Beckett being Beckett. My respect for his stage work means I can read his plays, even in part, and still swoon over the skill he brings to bear.
In summary, this book is likely more for the Beckett Completist, or the Beckett Academic, as it is mostly non-fiction and hardly utilizes popular culture referents for its topics. I tend toward the former, having read nearly all of his works, so I enjoyed this immensely, if not always grasping the finer details of some of the writings presented.
Not a book to start your Beckett adventures, but one you will get to as a matter of course because Beckett.
February 6, 2017
Es un libro complicado de abordar. El contexto es lejano y los escritos son escritos sobre otros escritos sobre (aun) otros escritos. Los postulados sobre estética son interesantes aunque a veces incomprensibles; lo demás pasa un poco por alto.
Definitivamente no es una lectura de gozo sino más bien es útil como lectura académica. No recomendado para llevar a la playa.
Definitivamente no es una lectura de gozo sino más bien es útil como lectura académica. No recomendado para llevar a la playa.
May 6, 2022
A scattered volume of miscellaneous stuff that Beckett mostly disowned but permitted to be published near his death. There are a couple of youthful manifestos, expressing in striking clarity the outlines of his general outlook -- writing as needing to express nothingness, the virtues of geometrical minimalism, a post-structuralist attitude towards the human psyche. His essay on Finnegans Wake ties in to this but is mostly focused on Joyce' adaptation of Vico's theory of language, in order to make the Wake an 'authentic form of expression'. A series of little articles follow, mostly quick critiques of mediocrities of his day, and some mostly vacuous letters discussing Beckett's progress on composing various early works.
More interesting, to my surprise, are his writings on fine art; his articles examining the relationship between object and depiction, painter and world, expression and form, all greatly elaborate upon his abstract style of avant-garde prose. His basic idea is a break from the anxiety of trying and failing to depict authentically, which results in a form of expression that expresses 'nothing' and for the first time permits the artist to boldly depict relations between created things -- this he finds in the paintings of the van Velde brothers, and he makes similar exegeses of the avant-garde artistry of Jack Yeats, Tal-Coat, and Hayden. It makes me wish he had been to the Weimar music scene and gotten to see Schoenberg's and Berg's similar efforts at expressionism, but here Beckett writes no more on music than to praise the silences that punctuate Beckett's 7th symphony.
It concludes on a half-finished early play, a Synge-like surrealist farce featuring the caprices of peasant life and building them into an early version of his later style, reminiscent a little of All That Fall.
It should be noted that Beckett, ashamed of these writings, didn't authorize translations and so many of these are written only in French and some in German; perhaps get a digital edition to use a translator or something if you can't read 'em.
More interesting, to my surprise, are his writings on fine art; his articles examining the relationship between object and depiction, painter and world, expression and form, all greatly elaborate upon his abstract style of avant-garde prose. His basic idea is a break from the anxiety of trying and failing to depict authentically, which results in a form of expression that expresses 'nothing' and for the first time permits the artist to boldly depict relations between created things -- this he finds in the paintings of the van Velde brothers, and he makes similar exegeses of the avant-garde artistry of Jack Yeats, Tal-Coat, and Hayden. It makes me wish he had been to the Weimar music scene and gotten to see Schoenberg's and Berg's similar efforts at expressionism, but here Beckett writes no more on music than to praise the silences that punctuate Beckett's 7th symphony.
It concludes on a half-finished early play, a Synge-like surrealist farce featuring the caprices of peasant life and building them into an early version of his later style, reminiscent a little of All That Fall.
It should be noted that Beckett, ashamed of these writings, didn't authorize translations and so many of these are written only in French and some in German; perhaps get a digital edition to use a translator or something if you can't read 'em.
November 22, 2021
This book is an invaluable scholarly resource for understanding non-literary writings in Beckett's oeuvre, and their importance to his artistry. There is a wealth of information from Beckett's early, middle, and later years that illuminate what he was up to during his career.
In particular, the essays on Finnegans Wake and Proust are wonderful, as is the dialogue written with Duthuit. All of these inform the casual or informed reader what Beckett was all about. The essays demonstrate that he viably could have been a literary critic, but knew better than to engage in such an enterprise. The dialogue with Duthuit is particularly fascinating as it depicts part of Beckett's highly idiosyncratic, complex aesthetic theories.
Anyone seeking to see a side of Beckett that fills in the considerable blanks in his literary works - look no further! You will not be disappointed by this collection.
In particular, the essays on Finnegans Wake and Proust are wonderful, as is the dialogue written with Duthuit. All of these inform the casual or informed reader what Beckett was all about. The essays demonstrate that he viably could have been a literary critic, but knew better than to engage in such an enterprise. The dialogue with Duthuit is particularly fascinating as it depicts part of Beckett's highly idiosyncratic, complex aesthetic theories.
Anyone seeking to see a side of Beckett that fills in the considerable blanks in his literary works - look no further! You will not be disappointed by this collection.
Read
January 19, 2023(Part of my current project of reading everything Beckett published in precise chronological order.)
As I've been reading through Beckett chronologically these past seven months or so, there have been a number of volumes I've had to read little by little - and not necessarily in order - over a quite extended period of time, dipping in when a piece in one of them popped up in the chronological list of his works that Ruby Cohn provides in A Beckett Canon. Disjecta is one of these volumes, and the fact that I'm finally finished with it is a potent reminder that I'm nearing the finish line.
Disjecta contains many disparate texts from across Beckett's whole career. Perhaps the most well-known text here is "Dante ... Bruno . Vico .. Joyce" - his essay on Joyce's Finnegans Wake, and the piece of Beckett's that first awakened me to just how important Dante was to him long before he really committed himself to being the writer of fiction, drama, and poetry we all know he became. But "Three Dialogues" is arguably just as important. It gives us a window into the literary sensibility that Beckett achieved after long tortuous years freeing himself from the academy, as well as from the long shadow of Joyce's influence on him. The Beckett we find in these dialogues is the mature Beckett, whose voice was defined by, as he put it, his conviction "that that there is nothing to express, nothing with which to express, nothing from which to express, no power to express, no desire to express, together with the obligation to express."
Besides these two key pieces, there are many short texts devoted to various of Beckett's artist and writer friends. A full appreciation of these pieces would require diving into the works of all of these people - something I did only cursorily: just enough to catch the drift of what Beckett was saying. Lastly, there is Beckett's early unfinished play, Human Wishes - a drama about the life of Samuel Johnson, of which Beckett only ever completed the first act, and in which we can only discern faint hints of revolutionary dramatic works he produced later.
All in all, this volume will mainly be of interest to completists like me, as well as scholars of course. However, it's worth looking at for "Dante ... Bruno . Vico .. Joyce" and "Three Dialogues" alone - both of which, I would say, are essential for any serious reader of Beckett.
As I've been reading through Beckett chronologically these past seven months or so, there have been a number of volumes I've had to read little by little - and not necessarily in order - over a quite extended period of time, dipping in when a piece in one of them popped up in the chronological list of his works that Ruby Cohn provides in A Beckett Canon. Disjecta is one of these volumes, and the fact that I'm finally finished with it is a potent reminder that I'm nearing the finish line.
Disjecta contains many disparate texts from across Beckett's whole career. Perhaps the most well-known text here is "Dante ... Bruno . Vico .. Joyce" - his essay on Joyce's Finnegans Wake, and the piece of Beckett's that first awakened me to just how important Dante was to him long before he really committed himself to being the writer of fiction, drama, and poetry we all know he became. But "Three Dialogues" is arguably just as important. It gives us a window into the literary sensibility that Beckett achieved after long tortuous years freeing himself from the academy, as well as from the long shadow of Joyce's influence on him. The Beckett we find in these dialogues is the mature Beckett, whose voice was defined by, as he put it, his conviction "that that there is nothing to express, nothing with which to express, nothing from which to express, no power to express, no desire to express, together with the obligation to express."
Besides these two key pieces, there are many short texts devoted to various of Beckett's artist and writer friends. A full appreciation of these pieces would require diving into the works of all of these people - something I did only cursorily: just enough to catch the drift of what Beckett was saying. Lastly, there is Beckett's early unfinished play, Human Wishes - a drama about the life of Samuel Johnson, of which Beckett only ever completed the first act, and in which we can only discern faint hints of revolutionary dramatic works he produced later.
All in all, this volume will mainly be of interest to completists like me, as well as scholars of course. However, it's worth looking at for "Dante ... Bruno . Vico .. Joyce" and "Three Dialogues" alone - both of which, I would say, are essential for any serious reader of Beckett.
November 30, 2017
Miscelánea de textos de Beckett sobre temas diversos (reseñas de libros, sobre pintura, cartas que no era partidario que se publicasen, obras incompletas)
No aportan nada a los textos de Beckett.
Quizás su extenso conocimiento artístico.
No se escribe nada sabiendo nada.
No aportan nada a los textos de Beckett.
Quizás su extenso conocimiento artístico.
No se escribe nada sabiendo nada.
April 5, 2021
honestly when I heard "Samuel Beckett writing on Mörike writing on Mozart" I kinda expected more of an illumination. Also basically a third of the book is in German/French/Italian, so at a point you just think how great Waiting for Godot is and I went and re-read that instead
August 10, 2014
Miscellaneous writings that Beckett finally allowed to be published. More useful to scholars, but some interesting stuff nonetheless. Original text, in French, of Beckett’s hoax lecture. His essay on Dante and Joyce. A previously unpublished play fragment “Human Wishes” from 1937. A bunch of reviews, and most importantly, some key letters. One excerpt from a letter discussing a publishers desire to edit down Murphy ends “And of course the narrative is hard to follow. And of course deliberately so.” And another letter, also on Murphy gives Weller his impetus for A Taste for The Negative. And then there is both the original German text as well as an English translation of the famous letter to Axel Kaun, where Beckett argues for “an assault against words in the name of beauty” and “As we cannot eliminate language all at once, we should leave nothing undone that might contribute to its falling into disrepute. To bore one hole after another in it, until what lurks behind it - be it something or a nothing - begins to seep through; I cannot imagine a higher goal for a writer today.” and on to say “to this literature of the unword, which is so desirable to me.”
December 12, 2010
For the "German Letter."
September 15, 2015
The essay "Dante...Bruno.Vico..Joyce" is wonderful and informative. The writings on art and Aesthetics is interesting. But more of a read for scholarly purposes than for pleasure.
Displaying 1 - 10 of 10 reviews