E-book details

Gombrowicz-Beckett. Beckett-Gombrowicz. A Comparative Inter-modal Study

Gombrowicz-Beckett. Beckett-Gombrowicz. A Comparative Inter-modal Study

Bartosz Lutostański

Ebook

An attempt to present another critical study about the fiction of Witold Gombrowicz (1904–1969) and Samuel Beckett (1906–1989) virtually amounts to Benedykt Chmielowski’s description of a horse in one of the first Polish encyclopaedias: what a horse is like, is for everyone to see. It therefore seems reasonable to lament, “Oh no! Another book on Gombrowicz/Beckett?! Not again!”

However, if such a negative attitude might make sense in a project dedicated solely to Gombrowicz or to Beckett, a project on both of them in one study is one never to have emerged before. Comparisons between both writers, usually in the context of their dramas, have been made, but in passing (for example see Gombrowicz nasz współczesny). Moreover, as can be seen from the above enumerations, “critical studies” of both seem to suffer from one “disease:” a relative deficiency in strictly formal inves-tigations. By formal I mean those which address the form and function of structure and composition of a particular work of prose fiction, not the examination of the notion of Gombrowiczan Form.

Introduction . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 7
1. Oh no! Not again . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 7
2. Why Gombrowicz and Beckett . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 11
3. Drama, Theatre and Narrative . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 15
4. Performance and Narrative . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 25
5. The Unnatural . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 27
6. The Structure of This Study . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 29
Chapter 1
Dramatic Narratives – Witold Gombrowicz’s Three Novels . . . . . . . . 33
1.1. From Narrative to Drama . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 33
1.1.1. “I feel a need to relate here” – preliminary remarks . . . . . . . 33
1.1.2. “I, a Polish writer, I, Gombrowicz” – on the narrators . . . . . . 40
1.1.2.1. Witold in Trans-Atlantyk . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 40
1.1.2.2. Witold in Pornografia . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 44
1.1.2.3. Witold in Cosmos . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 48
1.1.3. Witold’s language – gawęda . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 51
1.1.3.1. “To the Devil, the Devil, the Devil,
the Devil, the Devil!” . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 52
1.1.3.2. “Hey, hey, hey, I can still see them” . . . . . . . . . . . 62
1.1.3.3. “Heaven knows why” . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 68
1.1.4. Levels . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 85
1.2. Narrative as Drama . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 102
1.2.1. The poet of form . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 102
1.2.2. Narrative as drama . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 116
Chapter 2
Theatrical Narratives – Samuel Beckett’s Three Novels . . . . . . . . . . 135
2.1. From Narrative to Theatre . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 135
2.1.1. Openings and preliminary remarks . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 135
2.1.2. “I, Say I” – on the narrators . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 137
2.1.2.1. Molloy . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 141
2.1.2.2. Moran . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 153
2.1.2.3. Malone . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 161
2.1.2.4. The Unnamable . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 176
2.1.3. Narrative and monologue . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 195
2.1.3.1. “Let me tell you this” – monologue in Molloy . . . . . 195
2.1.3.2. “I will tell you nothing” – monologue in Moran . . . . 201
2.1.3.3. Monologue in Malone – writing fiction . . . . . . . . . 204
2.1.3.4. “Whatever you fancy” –
monologue in The Unnamable . . . . . . . . . . . . . 206
2.2. Narrative as Theatre . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 210
Conclusions . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 227
Notes . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 235
Works Cited . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 281

  • Title: Gombrowicz-Beckett. Beckett-Gombrowicz. A Comparative Inter-modal Study
  • Author: Bartosz Lutostański
  • ISBN: 978-83-8206-471-1, 9788382064711
  • Date of issue: 2022-07-27
  • Format: Ebook
  • Item ID: e_2un9
  • Publisher: Wydawnictwo Uniwersytetu Gdańskiego