Beckett studies

The minor character of Belacqua from Dante’s Purgatorio recurs often in Beckett’s early work. This article emphasizes the comic in its critical reading of Molloy, by studying how Beckett both adapted and parodied the language of the Commedia. Such an approach reveals the complex tension created by Beckett’s simultaneously parodic yet reverential appropriation of Dante’s language. This rhetorical strategy also points to a larger theme in the novel: subversive laughter aimed at theological, philosophical and literary authority.

As well as its oft-noted concern with mysticism and negative theology, Samuel Beckett’s work frequently returns to the figure of the incarnate Christ. This article explores two perspectives on Christ that can be found both in Beckett’s work and in religious writing from the European middle ages: the triumphant Jesus known as the Christus Victor, and the suffering Jesus, or Ecce Homo. Building on Mary Bryden’s work in this area, the article shows that just as medieval writers such as Julian of Norwich, Ludolf of Saxony, and Margery Kempe reject the contemplation of a transcendent or triumphant Jesus in favour of a vision of him on the cross, Beckett’s characters seem to prefer to think about Jesus’s suffering rather than contemplate his divinity, his miracles, or his resurrection. Although seemingly irreconcilable, the distinction between the kenotic Christ and the victorious Christ is, theologically speaking, a false one, and so both Beckett and his characters have to interpret the crucifixion in a peculiar way: the article reads Beckett’s poem ‘Ooftish’ as heretical complaint that the whole thing was a slight-of-hand on God’s part, an act of suffering that was staged rather than authentic. The article goes on to propose that the preference for the suffering Jesus on the part of Watt, Molloy, Malone and others is closely linked with Beckett’s own aesthetic allegiances. Taking a cue from comments made about Jesus by Murphy and by the Polar Bear in Dream of Fair to Middling Women, the essay argues that the wonder-working, triumphant Jesus was seen by Beckett as analogous to an author who interferes with the natural disorder of his novel, smoothing over its moments of failure and contradiction just as Jesus righted the vicissitudes of death and disease through miracles. The resigned, suffering Jesus, on the other hand, comes closer to the quietist aesthetic – and religious perspective – of André Gide and Fyodor Dostoevsky, writers that Beckett admired and wished to emulate. The article concludes with an analysis of notes made about the crucifixion and aesthetics in Beckett’s Watt notebooks, noting this razor’s edge in Christological thinking – one which was particularly alive to Christians of the middle ages.

When the English Molloy was published in 1955, jointly by Olympia (Paris) and Grove (New York), a long and difficult translation process had ended, on which Beckett worked both alone and together with Merlin and Patrick Bowles. This article is the first attempt to approach this somewhat neglected topic by way of manuscripts, notebooks, letters and other related materials, in order to establish a basic chronology of the English Molloy. In so doing, our purpose is to shed more light on a relatively obscure period in Beckett’s literary career and examine critically the role of each party involved.

This study aims to examine how Sartre’s existentialism is employed in Beckett’s plays: Waiting for Godot, Endgame, Krapp’s Last Tape, Play, and Not I. Throughout, the elements of existentialism in Beckett’s world are explored and combined with Sartre’s ideology. Philosophy and literature are not such different areas that they are thoroughly intertwined. It would be quite pertinent for philosopy to show and develop its concepts in literature; therefore, analogically, Sartre attempts to find a voice for his views in plays and novels in order to inquire his concepts. The focal point of this article is his existence in Beckett’s plays. Traditional philosophy sets its foot on the thinking subject and develops epistemologically while existential philosophy sets off the journey with the existing subject; a particular subject who is involved in a particular situation and develops ontologically. My aim is to get underneath the general statements of the Absurd Theatre, concentrating on the plays of one of the pioneering and influential voices of Absurdism: Samuel Beckett. The essence of the essay is not only the influences of Sartre’s existentialism on Beckett’s literature. It aims at Weltanschauung, a German word used to embody the differences and resemblances of both fields. Philosophy sheds light on literature while literature brings philosophy out into the open and enlightens it. In the first chapter, the essence of Sartre’s existentialism is explored and examined in Beckett’s plays. In the second chapter, the production of Beckett’s reduction, namely the Irreducible, is discussed in relation to Sartrean world. In the conclusion part, the relationship of Beckett and Sartre is summed up with their striking resemblances and considerable differences.

"Alchemical Traditions from Antiquity to the Avant-Garde,
ed. Aaron Cheak (Melbourne: Numen Books, 2013), 
ISBN 0987559826 (684 pages):
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http://www.amazon.com/Alchemical-Traditions-From-Antiquity-Avant-Garde/dp/0987559826 (http://www.facebook.com/alchemical.traditions).
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Alchemical Endgame:
‘Checkmate’ in Beckett and Eliot.
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‘Incredible Lunatic of the Future’:
The Alchemical Horticulture of Alan Chadwick.
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‘Take Two Emerald Tablets in the Morning’:
Surrealism and the Alchemical Transubstantiation of the World.
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‘Agent of All Mutations’:
Metallurgical, Biological & Spiritual Evolution
in—the—Alchemy—of—René—Schwaller—de—Lubicz.
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‘The Kiss of Death’:
Amor, Corpus Resurrectionis
and the Alchemical Transfiguration of Eros.
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‘Becoming an Angel’:
The Mundus Imaginalis of Henry Corbin
and—the—Platonic—Path—of—Self-Knowledge.
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Of Ether, Entheogens and Colloidal Gold:
Heinrich Khunrath and the Making of
a Philosophers’ Stone.
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Turris Philosophorum:
On the Alchemical Iconography of the Tower.
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Altus’ Ominous Aphorism:
Reading as an Alchemical Process.
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The Alchemical Khiasmos:
Counter-Stretched Harmony and Divine Self-Perception.
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‘Interzone’:
On the Origins and Nature of European Alchemy.
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Iatrochemistry,
Metaphysiology and Gnōsis:
Tibetan Alchemy in the Kālacakra Tantra.
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Mercury and Immortality:
The Hindu Alchemical Tradition.
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‘Taking from Water to Fill in Fire’:
The History and Dynamics of Taoist Alchemy.
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Metallurgy and Demiurgy:
The Roots of Greek Alchemy
in the Mythology of Hephaestos.
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Telestic Transformation and Philosophical Rebirth:
From Ancient Egypt to Neoplatonism.
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‘The Perfect Black’:
Egypt and Alchemy.
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AARON  Cheak

ALGIS  Uždavinys

ANGELA  Voss

CHRIS  Plaisance

DAN  Mellamphy

DAVID  White

HEREWALD  Tilton

KIM  Lai

LEON  Marvell

MIRCO  Manucci

PAUL  Scarpari

ROD  Blackhirst

SABRINA  Dalla Valle

— contributing authors.

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