Death in Beckett

            After reading Malone Dies, I was left with thoughts of a topic that Beckett seems to favor. The topic is death. The first sign that this novel will include death comes from the title. Malone knows he is going to die. However, there is still an uncertainty in him about when. “I shall soon be quite dead at last in spite of all. Perhaps next month. … Perhaps I am wrong, perhaps I shall survive Saint John the Baptist’s Day and even the Fourteenth of July, festival of freedom” (173). However, death does not seem to scare Malone at all. He handles the matter like it is an every day occurrence. We later find out that Malone is desensitized enough from death that he has even murdered people.

            I’ve talked about death before in this blog, but the circumstances of death are a little different in this novel than they were in “Ding-Dong.” In “Ding-Dong” the child’s death is an accident. Since it was accidental I can see how some people may write it off as being inevitable and of little significance to them. However, in Malone Dies Malone talks about how he murdered people with no sign of remorse. To me this is a whole new level of apathy. He seems to have no regard for human life. Perhaps that is why he could not care less about his own death.

            While I am not looking forward to death, I do know that it is inevitable. Nobody can live forever, and honestly nobody should live forever. There are many reasons why immortality would not be a good thing, and here is a comic by one of my favorite webcomics illustrating one of these reasons.

(http://www.explosm.net/comics/2742/)

Molloy

           

          One of my favorite things about reading a Beckett novel is that you can always find comedy if you look for it. No matter how melancholy the subject, there is always something hidden in the text that can make you laugh. An example of this can be found on page 13 of Molloy. Molloy is talking about his mother, and if someone in real life were to describe their mother in the same way we would be repulsed. It would be shocking to hear someone describe the situation in such detail, and it would be shocking to learn that someone actually lives like this. However, when Molloy describes the situation it is almost humorous. This is because Beckett is a master of word choice. He knows how to take a serious subject and word it in an unexpected way. For example, “My mother never refused to see me, that is she never refused to receive me, for it was many a long day since she had seen anything at all” (13).  When I read this sentence I could not help but laugh. While I still felt bad about the mother, I could also see the humor of the situation. Beckett does this again on page 17 when Molloy is being arrested. “He listened to his subordinate’s report and then began to interrogate me in a tone which, from the point of view of civility, left increasingly to be desired, in my opinion” (17). While Beckett could have said, “The police officer yelled at me,” and had the same meaning, it would not have had the same effect. Here Beckett proves just how important word choice can be for setting the tone of a piece.

Reflection on Ding-Dong

          After reading the stories in More Pricks than Kicks, one passage stood out to me: It came from the work “Ding-Dong” and can be found on page 102 of The Selected Works. In this passage Belacqua comes across a little girl who has been run over by a bus. However, rather than show any concern for the girl, Belacqua notices the state of the food she was carrying. “The good milk was all over the road and the loaf, which had sustained no injury, was sitting up against the kerb” (102). It struck me as odd that he was more concerned about the “good milk” than the girl. However, the story of the girl is not over yet. There were also spectators who were waiting in line for a movie. “The queue standing for the Palace Cinema was torn between conflicting desires to keep their places and to see the excitement” (102). Yet there is still no concern for the person harmed. The movie goers seem to only be worried about satisfying their thirst for entertainment. Whether it is making it into the movie or seeing live excitement, they could care less about the person who was harmed. I read on, and I saw one last hope that someone might help the girl. Another girl stepped out of the line. However, her intentions were not with the dead person in mind. “Only one girl, debauched in appearance and swathed in a black blanket, fell out near the sting of the queue and secured the loaf” (103). Once again the unaffected person was only concerned with her own needs.

          My original explanation of the nonchalant attitudes held by the bystanders was that they only cared about themselves. However, when I looked again, I came up with a different answer. From what I gathered in the text, I realized that the girl was probably beyond help at that point. Death is inevitable, so logically these people have no reason to mourn this stranger. Since she cannot be helped, they should focus on something that can be done. They can use the food to keep themselves alive. At the end of the day, life goes on, and we must do our best to get ourselves through it.

To end on a lighter note, here is a comic about death:

(www.xkcd.com/1065/)