Beckett and Theory
Jean-Michel Rabaté profile
TR 9-10:30
Fulfills Sector 1: Theory and Poetics of the English Standard Major
Fulfills Sector 6: 20th Century Literature of the English Standard Major
Fulfills Elective Seminar of the English Standard Major
In the last decades, Beckett’s importance for contemporary philosophical discourse has grown, and if no-one considers him to be a « philosopher » per se, he has attracted the attention of the most important recent theoreticians of literature, from Adorno to Badiou, from Cavell to Deleuze. Thus the focus of this course will be double—we will read Beckett’s main plays (Waiting for Godot, Endgame, Not I) and prose texts (especially the two trilogies), we will pay attention to his Film and to the later television plays, while foregrounding theoretical approaches to these: Derridian, Lacanian and neo-Marxist readings will be systematically discussed. We will conclude with an introduction to Deleuze’s and Badiou’s readings of Beckett.
Bibliography.
Samuel Beckett : Watt, The first Trilogy (Molloy, Malone Dies, The Unnamable), Collected Shorter Prose, Collected Plays, Nohow On.
Dan Katz, Saying I no More.
Thomas Tresize, Into the Breach.
Thomas Cousineau, After the Final No.
Branka Arsic, The Passive Eye.
Alain Badiou, On Beckett.
updated 2008-05-01
