Status Updates From Worstward Ho

...an old man and child...Hand in hand with equal plod they go. In the free hands - no. Free empty hands. Backs turned both bowed with equal plod they go. The child hand raised to reach the holding hand. Hold the old holding hand. Hold and be held. Plod on and never recede. Slowly with never a pause plod on and never recede. Backs turned. Both bowed. Joined by held holding hands. Plod on as one...

All of old. Nothing else ever. Ever tried. Ever failed. No matter. Try again. Fail again. Fail better.🥰

Enough. Sudden enough. Sudden all far. No move and sudden all far. All least. Three pins. One pinhole. In dimmost dim. Vasts apart. At bounds of boundless void. Whence no farther. Best worse no farther. Nohow less. Nohow worse. Nohow naught. Nohow on.

Said nohow on.

The twain. The hands. Held holding hands. That almost ring! As when first said on crippled hands the head. Crippled hands! They were then the words. Here now held holding. As when first said. Ununsaid when worse said. Away. Held holding hands!

The void. Unchanging. Say now unchanging. Void were not the one. The twain. So far were not the one and twain. So far.

The void. How try say? How try fail? No try no fail. Say only -

I read "Ill seen ill said" first, then the first and have now embarked on the last one in this trilogy. Bare bones and horror-like, as always Beckett leaves me exhausted (stop, can't take any more) and fascinated ...

"Realistic fiction"--and therefore the writing of realistic fiction--is a grossly obvious but mostly passed over contradiction. It occurs to me, reading this, Beckett's last major statement, that something like a reaction to this conundrum lies behind all of his fictional work.