SAMUEL BECKETT: Murphy, Molloy, Malone Dies, The Unnamable, How It Is, Watt, & Waiting for Godot

[@travelthroughstories]

What an absolute treat. The little I've read of Beckett indicates that he certainly deserves a 2+ hour discussion. Thank you for taking the time to making this, Chris! I'm eager to dive in!

[@LeafbyLeaf]

Very kind of you to say! I hope to have returned to Beckett even a splinter of what he has done for me.

[@mariagallagher6358]

Samuel Beckett.what a genius.

[@lukusridley]

It's fascinating that I read the unnamable before actually reading/seeing waiting for Godot and as a consequence it always felt to me deeply secondary; it felt to me that everything he ever did never quite managed to hit the perfection of the unnamable. It was, to me, aesthetically terminal; it felt perfect, like some kind of weird literary object carved on obsidian pillars in a desert; discovered, not written. Godot has some funny lines - I often hear "I can't go on like this. - That's what you think" - but while it's interesting it never moved me to tears, which even now I cannot stop myself from feeling when I read the final section of the unnamable. But then again why should it be like that for everybody else? The other thing that is odd to me about Beckett is that while the trilogy is wildly odd and unconventional something that appealed to me about it hugely is that there's no trickery. The unnamable is complete in itself, there's no artfulness or sophisticated analysis required. If you simply let it wash over you and fall down its rabbit hole its one of the most visceral books I've ever read. People have been so scared into thinking these kinds of books are intellectual games that Beckett feels like a test people are failing when the entire thing almost relies on that exact failure! It is *beautiful* Something I would note that wasn't mentioned is just how the first paragraph is, in essence, him discarding the possibility even for you to rely on the meaning of his language. "Call that going, call that on..." It's the most epistemically aggressive opening to a book I've ever read; he throws everything away in the first paragraph, all bets are off, so where can we go?

[@lukusridley]

God I just want to dump so many bits from it but of course honourary mention of "low types they must have been, their pockets full of antidote and poison..." when referring to those who presumably taught him language.... EDIT: thank you for this video, I enjoyed it greatly!

[@choggerboom]

My favorite writer. Sublime, dark, general, nonsensical, relatable, schizoid, melancholy and disturbed. He shared a similar lens as Kafka. I adore the trilogy. It’s also the funniest writing I’ve ever encountered. Intersticed with unbelievably moving breaks into poetry, and then back into nonsense. It’s a wild geode of a work. Give Molloy a try. Has anyone found a writer as hilarious as Beckett? Pynchon certainly comes close.

[@misawaelbow]

My favorite author of all time, he gives language a heartbeat and a soul

[@LeafbyLeaf]

🙌🙌🙌

[@juantorres90]

Best sentence of all, best expression of all, the one about Malone Dies: "It's beautiful." That is the gist of the experience of reading Beckett. It is just beautiful. Words do not seem to capture the degree of beauty his writing attains. Perhaps that is his greatest achievement: making things so beautiful one can do nothing but be silent. And so one reaches experience, sense, feeling. Thank you for this video. I know it is a great, toiling effort. Thank you.

[@atefless]

This is like a feature film. You are doing something really unique.

[@LeafbyLeaf]

Unique and possibly neurotic. 😁

[@fishheart131]

Wow. This is not a review. It's a tall and thoughtful and fastidious dissertation. Well done, Dr. Via. An impressively earned PhD in Beckettian Poetics.

[@LeafbyLeaf]

Thanks so much, David!

[@patrickmchugh4616]

Molloy, Malone Dies, and The Unnamable are an astonishing trilogy. I read them in a kind of hallucinatory daze at night while teaching in China. There is a quote early on in "Molloy" that encapsulates a lot of what Beckett has produced in these works: "that you would do better, at least no worse, to obliterate texts than to blacken margins, to fill in the holes of words till all is blank and flat and the whole ghastly business looks like what it is, senseless, speechless, issueless misery.” One of my favorite authors, Donald Barthelme, has said in interviews that some authors so transform, and thus shape the possibilities of what can be done in literature that a would-be author can do nothing but write in opposition to them. For Barthelme, Beckett was such a figure, and Joyce was for Beckett.

[@natashapbooks]

I actually miss those 3-hour-long videos ("Infinite Jest" was about 3-h long, I think 😊 ) I'd just sometimes play them in the background, I find them very relaxing. Plus I pick up something new every time I listen. Thank you, Chris

[@LeafbyLeaf]

So very kind of you to say, Natasha! (The infamous _Gravity's Rainbow_ video is 3.5 hours long; _Infinite Jest_ is a scant 1.5 hours 😜)

[@dannycrowley9630]

I went down a big Beckett rabbit hole like 6 months ago that started by reading the trilogy. Currently working on a full scale adaptation of Waiting for Godot in comics!!

[@anilkapahi8788]

I keep a quote notebook and Beckett, Shakespeare, and Cormac McCarthy are well represented. Maybe my favorite Beckett quote: "All I know is what the words know, and dead things, and that makes a handsome little sum, with a beginning and a middle and an end, as in the well-built phrase and the long sonata of the dead." from Molloy

[@LeafbyLeaf]

What a guy he was!

[@oatmeal2419]

can’t wait to watch this when i get a chance! love beckett. cool to see you doing longer form videos

[@LeafbyLeaf]

It's always risky posting these long-form videos--so I thank you for letting me know it's appreciated.

[@martingarcia3360]

Because of you I bought many of Beckett’s work. I just finished Watt and I’m glad I did. Most of the time I laughed because of the absurdity of it all. The tryin to list all possibilities. The funniest scene to me was the trial…. and the contemplations of the dog….. and the endless series. All the while I was reading these scenes I felt an underlying angst. It felt like a screaming and trying because of it’s necessity, and the necessity also of not trying to make sense of it all. Wonderful novel. Thank you. Blood Meridian is next 😊

[@LeafbyLeaf]

And when considered in the perspective of Beckett writing _Watt_ to hold onto the last shreds of his sanity while in hiding during Nazi-occupied France--it's all the more unsettling/astonishing!

[@fj103]

Thank you for this. Would be amazing to do an episode on Beckett's letters.

[@LeafbyLeaf]

Hold my book...

[@B4CKWARDS_CH4RM]

Wow. That intro audio alone sold me on him. How beautiful

[@LeafbyLeaf]

I completely agree. That is absolutely the best part of this video. I am so grateful for that volunteer from Dublin!

[@brendanward2991]

Thank you for this wonderful introduction to Beckett's life and works. I agree that Deirdre Bair's biography is an excellent entrée to Beckett. I have been meaning to reread the trilogy, but this time in French (dictionary in one hand, Beckett in the other). Your enthusiasm for my fellow Dubliner is infectious.

[@LeafbyLeaf]

Cheers, Brendan! Here's to all of Dublin and her inhabitants!

[@barbarajohnson1442]

As a lover of Proust, ( I haven't managed to stay with Joyce, other than Portrait of an Artist) I read Becketts book essay on Proust. And loved it, and of course loved Waiting for Godot. Thank you for this beautiful lecture on Beckett. I know Zizek loves Malone Dies, as well. You have provided me with my next immersion, and it is desperately needed. Thank you again. Always a rewarding experience.

[@andrewmatthews5477]

Oh boy!!! I can't wait to listen to this. Beckett is like scripture to me, especially his famous 'trilogy.'

[@LeafbyLeaf]

:):):)

[@MaximTendu]

I was waiting for this one. As already proved by your previous video on Gravity's Rainbow, whenever you raise the shot, you hit the mark. Bien joué, Monsieur Christophe.🥂

[@LeafbyLeaf]

Merci mille fois, mon ami !

[@andrewmatthews5477]

Thanks for this! I knew next to nothing about the man himself. It's clear from his writing that he was committed to his art, but I didn't know it was to a dangerous degree. What a special person and what an incredible gift he gave us. Can't wait to see what you pick next!

[@LeafbyLeaf]

I, too, found his dedication to his art strikingly endearing! So glad to be able to share it with other. Happy reading!

[@alexgdsu7785]

i got SO EXCITED seeing this on my feed this morning. THANK YOU CHRIS 🙌🙌🙌🙌🙌🙌🙌🙌

[@LeafbyLeaf]

My pleasure! Hope you enjoy it!

[@Bob-kt6bi]

leaf by leaf! thankyou for the amazing content! even though you don't get many views, i bet your viewer engagement is orders of magnitude higher than other channels. You completely got me back into reading, or into reading 'seriously' for the first time in my life. I went out and bought a box of books that im working my way through (I think of it as a miniturized version of your giant library :D). The same goes for cliff seargent at better than food. I think youtube book channels are tremedously underrated, and reading is a beautiful solution to the problem of escaping the joys-or-not-so-much of modern technology. Thankyou!

[@danishiqbal09]

What an absolute treat to find the fav author feature here..people generally remember him for his plays, however, his prose works stand taller, to my mind. also, Murphy remains one of the most moving novels for all these years.

[@jamesgwarrior1981]

This is so so cool. I’ve only gotten to “Godot,” and have always hoped for something like this. 📖

[@LeafbyLeaf]

Hope you enjoy!

[@grantbeale4715]

Chris, thank you so much for this video. I am watching/listening to it for the second time. Really getting into the idea of diving into Beckett. Your enthusiasm is infectious.

[@LeafbyLeaf]

I highly recommend the Beckett immersion! Happy reading!

[@sonybluraydisk]

"Strangled into a state of respiration" might be my new favorite

[@LeafbyLeaf]

Oxymoronic sublimity !

[@landonmccarlson]

Love these super long videos! Your Gravity’s Rainbow video is one of my favorites ever.

[@LeafbyLeaf]

Thanks so much for the feedback. One wonders what the Internet people will think of such antics. 😁

[@timkjazz]

Beckett at first wanted to refuse the Nobel Prize but his wife Suzanne, who thought the burden of Nobel fame would probably be an unthinkable burden for the very private Beckett, nonetheless convinced Samuel it would be too rude to refuse such a prestigious award so Beckett reluctantly accepted the award. Deidre Bair's biography is very worthy. The great modernist writer, Beckett is basically a singular, unclassifiable talent, linguistically challenging and rewarding and an absolute pleasure to read and re-read. The trilogy is one of my very favorite works along with Watt and Murphy, works belonging on the very highest shelf of literature. Will check out the full review tonight along with a couple ice cold bottles of Guinness. I'm sure it will be brilliant as all Chris' reviews are that I've heard.

[@ajeyingole7733]

Thank You So Much for This Masterpiece... Eternally GreatFull

[@LeafbyLeaf]

My pleasure! So thrilled you're getting something out of it!

[@milfredcummings717]

So many things to do today! Two hours video about Samuel Beckett?! Nothing to be done!

[@LeafbyLeaf]

😆

[@travisheldreth5021]

I like that you move from appreciating the mention of Laurel and Hardy to an Abbot and Costello sounding bit on Watt and Knott. Also, whatnot is a very interesting word.

[@robotummy]

Wow, yet another feat, Chris! Just wanted to offer heartfelt congratulations at producing another immense video of high calibre. Looking forward to finishing it over the weekend... translation work calls this morning!

[@curtainthief]

We’ll done, Chris! I’ve been looking forward to this since you first teased it on Goodreads. Keep it up.

[@LeafbyLeaf]

Thanks so much! Happy reading, my friend!

[@williamlowe5525]

Fantastic video, Chris! I’ve seen so many of your reviews, and they are always well-researched and insightful. It is obvious that you have a passion for ideas. This review makes me all-the-more excited to read Beckett. Thanks again!

[@williamlowe5525]

Also, if you see this comment (I hope you do), how can I get a PDF of Theroux’s dissertation?

[@LeafbyLeaf]

Thanks so much for your kind words! It is such a thrill to know that these videos get people excited about reading! As far as the PDF, go to the about section on my channel and you can get my email. Just send me an email and I will reply with the goods!

[@williamlowe5525]

Hey Chris, thanks for the reply. I checked the About section and, unless I missed it, you didn’t provide your email address. Sorry to bother you about this!

[@LeafbyLeaf]

No bother, my friend. It’s: [e-mail]

[@thescribe413]

Really excited to watch this man! I had a feeling you’d get to Beckett eventually.

[@LeafbyLeaf]

Hope you enjoy it!

[@ethang.miller4861]

This video is incredible!!! So much effort and beautiful information compiled in one place.

[@LeafbyLeaf]

Very gracious of you to say. All my best to you!

[@merryberry21]

At 51.45, also an additional layer in the Irish ‘craic’ - ‘enjoyable social activity; a good time. “he loves the craic, the late nights"’

[@LeafbyLeaf]

Ahhhhh, thanks so much for this valuable input!

[@merryberry21]

@@LeafbyLeaf thank you - your videos grow each time - very grateful for your work

[@toddmaclean7444]

Fantastic work Chris! Thank you for all the time, thought, and energy you have put into this epic presentation on Beckett.... now about that potential video on Pynchon's Against the Day....😉

[@LeafbyLeaf]

I was just thinking about _Against the Day_ for 2023!

[@stephenmurphy8349]

Thoroughly enjoyed this. How do I get a copy of the The Language of Samuel Becket by Alexander Theroux pdf you mentioned Chris? I do not have your email. Thanks!

[@julzAas]

In The Unnamable I see origins common to Barth's Autobiography from Lost in the Funhouse: "You who listen give me life", and "my last words will be my last words". And much of the trilogy reminds me of Sokolov's A School for Fools. (:

[@LeafbyLeaf]

Nice connection between Beckett and Barth! I still haven't read the Sokolov but it has been on my list for a while.

[@marinellamaccagni6951]

What an awesome review! Magnificent!

[@LeafbyLeaf]

Grazie, grazie!

[@PatchyTheFox]

FINALLY uploading the BookTube Newbie Tag!!!

[@Ematched]

Nearly 2-1/2 hours on Beckett? Yes, please.

[@LeafbyLeaf]

:):):)

[@russellmagee8300]

"Beckett spent his entire life laboring torturously over satisfyingly capturing in language nothing; and he failed perfectly." Wow, so well said.

[@LeafbyLeaf]

I was pretty proud of it myself! I did find inspiration for the statement from Theroux's dissertation, it must be said.

[@russellmagee8300]

@@LeafbyLeaf Ah I love that! well done, both in the description and the video as a whole, truly a fantastic, in-depth exploration of one of the best

[@bengoodwin2988]

Another excellent video, thank you! Interesting parallels between Beckett and Burroughs, who spent the three volumes of his disorienting Nova trilogy trying to articulate a radical silence.

[@braag93]

Perfect video. Much appreciated (I guess I’ll have to dive into my unread trilogy copy)!

[@juantorres90]

You'll find many treasures there. Malone dies, a favorite! Strange little things.

[@aspirant7713]

I'm amazed by the repertoire of a writer's vocabulary . How could you have such a vast collection of words . What's your source of knowing words other than reading books. Would u recommend me any books for knowing obscure , recondite & grandiloquent words. I , myself , an ameteur logophile im always facinated by the beautiful words and prose . what's list of books should one wordssmith/logophile should possessed ? I like to learn new words thematically , is there any specific books like that.

[@mikehochburns8740]

The San Quintin production is the best

[@justininfrance]

I can thoroughly recommend the Naxos Audiobook of the trilogy, brilliantly narrated (the quality of reading is vital with Beckett). The second part of Molloy remains one of the funniest stories in literature.

[@thomassimmons1950]

Sam saved my life.

[@LeafbyLeaf]

In many respects, he wrote to save his life and didn't realize he would save others.

[@PanicsMannequin]

hold on, lemme get my popcorn and drink ready

[@LeafbyLeaf]

🤪🤪🤪

[@timkjazz]

Poguemahone - Patrick McCabe - check it out Chris, just bought it yesterday, seems like a book right up your alley.

[@LeafbyLeaf]

You are the fifth person now to recommend this to me within the last few days. Ordering now!

[@lalitborabooks]

Just by thumbnail I am completely in for thr video. I have Malone trilogy which I have yet to read. Thank you for this incredible video. I will comment after completing it.

[@LeafbyLeaf]

Thanks and enjoy!

[@freddywilson6784]

Can you please link where I can purchase the shirt you're wearing in this video?

[@LeafbyLeaf]

www.redbubble.com/i/t-shirt/Ulysses-Map-by-grrrenadine/39564315.1YYVU

[@adamgrimsley2900]

Just bought these

[@LeafbyLeaf]

🙌🙌🙌

[@reaganwiles_art]

WATT is also my favorite of these, though I cannot speak to HOW IT IS. How is it?

[@LeafbyLeaf]

How _How It Is_ is is not like _Watt_ is but is only how _How It Is_ is.

[@reaganwiles_art]

@@LeafbyLeaf I finished HOW IT IS yesterday. I'm going to listen again to your remarks on it. I'd have to read it several times to see what is going on.

[@rickharsch8797]

Chris, maybe your best. I did not intend to wake up and spend an Apocalypse Now's worth of time looking at my phone and being talked to (about nothing?). I did of course go pee.

[@LeafbyLeaf]

Haha! Always a pleasure to hear from you, Rick!

[@freddywilson6784]

Not to pick as soon as I start the video, but check out Endgame as well! There's an incredible performance with David Thewlis here on youtube

[@LeafbyLeaf]

I toyed with adding _Endgame_ and _Krapp's Last Tape_ but the video was simply as long as I wanted it to be. But, you're totally right: the absence of _Endgame_ should not in any way indicate its worth or priority. Perhaps a follow-up video is in order here...

[@freddywilson6784]

@@LeafbyLeaf more Beckett content? Oh heavens noooooo /s

[@shaanparwani]

I'm going to read beckett today is waiting for godot good.

[@JoeHarkinsHimself]

diction lessons are a good thing. you should try them.

[@LeafbyLeaf]

Thanks for the feedback!

[@reaganwiles_art]

Ever review Fred Chappell on here NC?

[@merryberry21]

Also the old Beckett scholar dictum - beware the Bair!

[@LeafbyLeaf]

I have caught inklings of such sentiments, but as a non-critical biography I think it's wonderful. Next up for me is James R. Knowlson's _Damned to Fame_ .

[@merryberry21]

@@LeafbyLeaf oh I loved it :-). My supervisor did not share my passion however. I have a daft love for Beckett’s early English language prose. Beyond amazing that you’ve covered so much - Watt and Murphy so often don’t feature

[@evannece3856]

another home run

[@LeafbyLeaf]

Thanks and happy reading!

[@Johnconno]

This was preceded by an advert for TikTok...

[@LeafbyLeaf]

Bizarre, on multiple levels.

[@Johnconno]

@@LeafbyLeaf Do you think it was deliberate?

[@LeafbyLeaf]

Seem strange that KZbin would approve a TikTok ad on their platform-but who knows how much money TikTok might have offered.

[@pedrosaldanha6802]

Embora becket insinue schopenhauer em muito do que diz este nao teve o.prazer de conhece lo

[@LeafbyLeaf]

Indeed.

[@michaelrhodes4712]

"Almost all the questions of most interest to speculative minds are such as science cannot answer, and the confident answers of theologians no longer seem so convincing as they did in former centuries. Is the world divided into mind and matter, and, if so, what is mind and what is matter? Is mind subject to matter, or is it possessed of independent powers? Has the universe any unity or purpose? Is it evolving towards some goal? Are there really laws of nature, or do we believe in them only because of our innate love of order? Is man what he seems to the astronomer, a tiny lump of impure carbon and water impotently crawling on a small and unimportant planet? Or is he what he appears to Hamlet? Is he perhaps both at once? Is there a way of living that is noble and another that is base, or are all ways of living merely futile? If there is a way of living that is noble, in what does it consist, and how shall we achieve it? Must the good be eternal in order to deserve to be valued, or is it worth seeking even if the universe is inexorably moving towards death? Is there such a thing as wisdom, or is what seems such merely the ultimate refinement of folly? To such questions no answer can be found in the laboratory. Theologies have professed to give answers, all too definite; but their very definiteness causes modern minds to view them with suspicion. The studying of these questions, if not the answering of them, is the business of philosophy. Why, then, you may ask, waste time on such insoluble problems? To this one may answer as a historian, or as an individual facing the terror of cosmic loneliness." -Bertrand Russell

[@brendanward2991]

I've just finished How It Is. It ain't no page-turner. Watt, in comparison, is a thriller. Something wrong there.