(better than fine)

The most comical thing in the world

"The farther he goes the more good it does me. I don’t want philosophies, tracts, dogmas, creeds, ways out, truths, answers, nothing from the bargain basement. He is the most courageous, remorseless writer going and the more he grinds my nose in the shit the more I am grateful to him. He’s not f---ing me about, he’s not leading me up any garden path, he’s not slipping me a wink, he’s not flogging me a remedy or a path or a revelation or a basinful of breadcrumbs, he’s not selling me anything I don’t want to buy — he doesn’t give a bollock whether I buy or not — he hasn’t got his hand over his heart. Well, I’ll buy his goods, hook, line and sinker, because he leaves no stone unturned and no maggot lonely. He brings forth a body of beauty. His work is beautiful."

And there you were, thinking maybe I had in fact written that beautiful paragraph, but unfortunately, no such luck. It's something Harold Pinter wrote about Samuel Beckett, and it's just the best I can come up with - I don't wanna write a crappy review of his work, what the hell do I know about it, so let's just let somebody who knows best describe it. It is hard to describe a genious and his work - and sometimes it is even harder to watch the result. "Endgame" is a play of Samuel Beckett's I read in high school, and it stayed with me and some of my friends until now, when we got the chance to see the play. Apart from some changes that didn't please any of us, it was great seeing how they take the text and work with it, in very different ways than I would have imagined it. Some things looked better on paper (middle monologue the "I can't leave you" repetitions, for example). But the ending made me feel so much sadder than the book had. Much more dramatic and lonely than I thought while reading it. Maybe the lighting, maybe the actor, maybe all of it together. All I know is that it was, without any doubt, deeply sad.

It is not an easy play to watch - but, like the quote says, that is not Beckett's point. As he says, in the preface of the book: "My subject is failure". So you can't really expect something happy, colors and bunnies everywhere. But who says there can only be beauty in that? The text is full of repetitions - there are no more blankets, sedatives, caramels, people, hope, future or past - there is nothing left. Clov is always leaving Hamm, and yet he always returns. They are always "making progress", although nothing ever changes. They just exist, alone, in the dark, in the grey, tormenting each other until... until maybe they can cease to exist.

"Nothing is funnier than unhappiness, I grant you that.... Yes, yes, it's the most comical thing in the world", they say in the play. Well, it may not be so funny (Although the play has very comical moments, even with all their unhappiness) - but it is, indeed, a beautiful thing.

pics:http://www.samuel-beckett.net/Beckett_3.JPG - (+ the Harold Pinter quote)

http://www.teatroestoria.it/illustrazioni/SAMUEL%20BECKETT.jpg

posted by Julia Moreira Leite @ 4:59 AM