Three Novels: Malloy, Malone Dies, The Unnamable

by Samuel Beckett

  No, the fury is past. Nothing but fear. Nothing of all its due but fear centupled. Fear of its shadow? No: blind from birth. Of sound then? If you like, we'll have that - one must have something (it's a pity, but there it is). Fear of sound, fear of sounds: the sounds of beasts, the sounds of men, sounds in the daytime and sounds at night (that's enough). Fear of sounds, all sounds (more or less). More or less fear.

  All sounds? There's only one: continuous, day and night. What is it? It's steps coming and going. It's voices speaking for a moment. It's bodies groping their way. It's the air, it's things, it's the air among the things (that's enough), that I seek. Like it? No, not like it: like me. In my own way.

  What am I saying (after my fashion)? That I seek. What do I seek now? What it is (it must be that, it can only be that): what it is, what it can be. What what can be? What I seek - no, what I hear (now it comes back to me, all back to me). They say I seek what it is I hear (I hear them, now it comes back to me): what it can possibly be, and where it can possibly come from (since all is silent here, and the walls thick). And how I manage, without feeling an ear on me (or a head, or a body, or a soul) - how I manage...... to do what? How I manage.....

  [It's not clear? Dear dear! You say it's not clear? Something is wanting to make it clear? I'll seek, what is wanting, to make everything clear. (I'm always seeking something, it's tiring in the end - and it's only the beginning.)]

  .....how I manage, under such conditions, to do what I'm doing. What am I doing? I must find out what I'm doing. "Tell me what you're doing and I'll ask you how it's possible."

  I hear, you say I hear. And that I seek (it's a lie, I seek nothing - nothing any more: no matter, let's leave it, no harking), and that I seek. (Listen to them now, jogging my memory!) Seek what? Firstly what it is. Secondly where it comes from. Thirdly how I manage, to do it (seeing that this, considering that that, inasmuch as God knows what - that's clear now): how I manage to hear, and how I manage to understand (it's a lie - what would I understand with, that's what I am asking?), how I manage to understand. Oh not the half, not the hundredth, nor the five thousandth (let us go on dividing by fifty), nor the quarter millionth (that's enough): but a little nevertheless - it's essential, it's preferable. (It's a pity, but there it is.) Just a little all the same, the least possible. It's appreciable, it's enough: the rough meaning of one expression in a thousand, in ten thousand (let us go on multiplying by ten, nothing more restful than arithmetic), in a hundred thousand, in a million.

  It's too much, too little. We've gone wrong somewhere. No matter: there is no great difference here between one expression and the next. When you've grasped one you've grasped them all. (I am not in that fortunate position.) All! How you exaggerate! Always out for the whole hog, the all of all and the all of nothing - never in the happy golden. "Never", "always" - it's too much, too little: "often", "seldom".

  Let me now sum up (after this digression).

  There is I (yes, I feel it, I confess, I give in): there is I, it's essential (it's preferable). I wouldn't have said so, I won't always say so. So let me hasten to take advantage of being now obliged to say (in a manner of speaking) that there is I, on the one hand, and this noise on the other. That I never doubted. (No, let us be logical: there was never any doubt about that.) This noise, on the other (if it is the other): that will very likely be the theme of our next deliberation.

  I sum up. (Now that I'm here it's I will do the summing up, it's I will say what is to be said and then say what it was. That will be jolly!) I sum up: I and this noise. I see nothing else for the moment, but I have only just taken over my functions. I and this noise. (And what about it? Don't interrupt me, I am doing my best.) I repeat: I and this noise. On the subject of which (inverting the natural order) we would seem to know for certain, among other things, what follows: namely, on the one hand (with regard to the noise), that it has not been possible up to date to determine with certainty, or even approximately, what it is, in the way of noise - or how it comes to me, or by what organ it is emitted, or by what perceived, or by what intelligence apprehended (in its main drift). And on the other, that is to say with regard to me (this is going to take a little longer) - with regard to me (nice time we're going to have now) - with regard to me, that it has not yet been our good fortune to establish with any degree of accuracy what I am, where I am: whether I am words among words, or silence in the midst of silence (to recall only two of the hypotheses launched in this connection). (Though silence to tell the truth does not appear to have been very conspicuous up to now. But appearances may sometimes be deceptive.) I resume: not yet our good fortune to establish, among other things, what I am (no, sorry - already mentioned), what I'm doing, how I manage to hear (if I hear, if it's I who hear), and how to understand (ellipse when possible, it saves time) - how to understand (same observation), and how it happens (if it's I who speak - and it may be assumed it is, as it may be suspected it is not), how it happens (if it's I who speak) that I speak without ceasing, that I long to cease, that I can't cease (I indicate the principal divisions: it's more synoptic). I resume: not the good fortune to establish, with regard to me (if it's I who seek), what exactly it is I seek, find, lose, find again, throw away, seek again, find again, throw away again (no, I never threw anything away, never threw anything away of all the things I found, never found anything that I didn't lose, never lost anything that I mightn't as well have thrown away); if it's I who seek, find, lose, find again, lose again, seek in vain, seek no more: if it's I, what it is (and if it's not I, who it is, and what it is).

  I see nothing else for the moment.

  Yes, I do.

  I conclude: not the good fortune to establish, considering the futility of my telling myself even any old thing, to pass the time, why I do it (if it's I who do it).

  As if reasons were required for doing any old thing to pass the time! No matter, the question may be asked (off the record): why time doesn't pass, doesn't pass, from you? Why it piles up all about you, instant on instant, on all sides, deeper and deeper, thicker and thicker? (Your time, others' time, the time of the ancient dead and the dead yet unborn.) Why it buries you grain by grain neither dead nor alive? With no memory of anything, no hope of anything, no knowledge of anything, no history and no prospects, buried under the seconds, saying any old thing, your mouth full of sand. Oh I know it's immaterial: time is one thing, I another. But the question may be asked, why time doesn't pass? (Just like that, off the record, en passant - to pass the time.)

  I think that's all, for the moment. I see nothing else (I see nothing whatever), for the time being.

  But I really mustn't ask myself any more questions (if it's I), I really must not.

  More resolutions, while we're at it. (That's right: resolutely, more resolutions.) Make abundant use of the principle of parsimony, as if it were familiar to me (it is not too late). Assume notably henceforward that the thing said and the thing heard have a common source (resisting for this purpose the temptation to call in question the possibility of assuming anything whatever). Situate this source in me (without specifying where exactly, no finicking): anything is preferable to the consciousness of third parties and (more generally speaking) of an outer world. Carry if necessary this process of compression to the point of abandoning all other postulates than that of a deaf half-wit, hearing nothing of what he says and understanding even less.. Evoke at painful junctures (when discouragement threatens to raise its head) the image of a vast cretinous mouth (red, blubber and slobbering) in solitary confinement, extruding indefatigably (with a noise of wet kisses and washing in a tub) the words that obstruct it. Set aside once and for all (at the same time as the analogy with orthodox damnation) all idea of beginning and end. Overcome (that goes without saying) the fatal leaning towards expressiveness. Equate me (without pity or scruple) with him who exists (somehow, no matter how, no finicking), with him whose story this story had the brief ambition to be. Better: ascribe to me a body. Better still: arrogate to me a mind. S
peak of a world of my own (sometimes referred to as the inner) without choking. Doubt no more. Seek no more. Take advantage of the brand-new soul and substantiality to abandon, with the only possible abandon, deep down within. And finally (these and other decisions having been taken) carry on cheerfully as before.

  Something has changed nevertheless. Not a word about Mahood, or Worm, for the past..... Ah yes, I nearly forgot: speak of time, without flinching. And what is more, it just occurs to me (by a natural association of ideas), treat of space with the same easy grace. As if it were not bunged up on all sides, a few inches away. After all that's something - a few inches - to be thankful for. It gives one air: room for the tongue to loll, to have lolled, to loll on.

  When I think (that is to say..... no, let it stand), when I think of the time I've wasted with these bran-dips (beginning with Murphy, who wasn't even the first), when I had me on the premises, within easy reach! Tottering under my own skin and bones (real ones), rotting with solitude and neglect, till I doubted my own existence. And even still, today, I have no faith in it, none: so that I have to say, when I speak, "Who speaks?" - and seek. And so on and similarly for all the other things that happen to me and for which someone must be found (for things that happen must have someone to happen to). Someone must stop them. But Murphy and the others (and last but not least the two old buffers here present) could not stop them, the things that happened to me. Nothing could happen to them, of the things that happened to me. And nothing else either: there is nothing else (let us be lucid for once), nothing else but what happens to me (such as speaking, and such as seeking), and which cannot happen to me - which prowl round me, like bodies in torment: the torment of no abode, no repose. No, like hyenas, screeching and laughing (no, no better - no matter). I've shut my doors against them, I'm not at home to anything, my doors are shut against them. Perhaps that's how I'll find silence, and peace at last: by opening my doors, and letting myself be devoured. They'll stop howling, they'll start eating, the maws now howling. "Open up, open up! You'll be all right, you'll see!"

  What a joy it is, to turn and look astern, between two visits to the depths! Scan in vain the horizon for a sail! It's a real pleasure, upon my word it is, to be unable to drown, under such conditions. Yes, but there it is: I am far from my doors, far from my walls. Someone would have to wake the turnkey (there must be one somewhere).

  Far from my subject too. Let us get back to it.

  It's gone! No longer there where I thought I last saw it!

  [Strange this mixture of solid and liquid.]

  Where was I? Ah yes, my subject: no longer there, or no longer the same. Or I mistake the place?

  No?

  Yes?

  It's the same, still there, in the same place. It's a pity. I would have liked to lose it, I would have liked to lose me: lose me the way I could long ago (when I still had some imagination) - close my eyes and be in a wood, or on the seashore. Or in a town where I don't know anyone. It's night, everyone has gone home. I walk the streets, I lash into them one after the other. It's the town of my youth. I'm looking for my mother to kill her. (I should have thought of that a bit earlier, before being born.) It's raining, I'm all right. I stride along on the crown of the street with great yaws to left and right.

  Now that's all over: with closed eyes I see the same as with them open, namely.....

  Wait: I'll say it, I'll try and say it. I'm curious to know what it can possibly be that I see (with closed eyes, with open eyes).

  Nothing. I see nothing.

  Well that is a disappointment! I was hoping for something better than that.

  Is that what it is to be unable to lose yourself? (I'm asking myself a question). Is that what it is: to see nothing, no matter where I look? Nor, eyeless, the little creature in his different guises: coming and going (now in shadow, now in light, doing his best, seeking the means of staying among the living, of getting off with his life), or shut up looking out of the window at the ever-changing sky. Is that it, to be unable to lose myself? I don't know. What did I see in the old days, when I ventured a quick look? I don't know, I don't remember. There I am in any case equipped with eyes, which I open and shut (two, perhaps blue), knowing it avails nothing. (For I have a head now too, where all manner of things are known.)

  Can it be of me I'm speaking? Is it possible? Of course not: that's another thing I know. I'll speak of me when I speak no more. In any case it's not a question of speaking of me, but of speaking, of speaking no more.

  This slight confusion augurs well.

  Now I'll have to find a name for this latest surrogate, his head splitting with vile certainties and his doll's eyes.

  Later on, later on. First I must describe him in greater detail, see what he's capable of, whence he comes and whither he returns (in his head of course - we don't intend to relapse into picaresque, with the stink of Mahood and Worm still in our nostrils).

  Now it's I the orator. The beleaguerers have departed. I am master on board (after the rats). I no longer crawl between the thwarts, under the moon, in the shadow of the lash.

  Strange this mixture of solid and liquid! A little air is all we need to complete the elements. (No, I'm forgetting fire.) Unusual hell when you come to think of it. Perhaps it's paradise. Perhaps it's the earth. Perhaps it's the shores of a lake beneath the earth. You scarcely breathe, but you breathe (it's not certain). You see nothing. (Hear nothing? You hear the long kiss of dead water and mud.) Aloft at less than a score of fathoms men come and go. You dream of them: in your long dream there's a place for the waking. You wonder how you know all you know. You even see grass - grass at dawn, glaucous with dew: not so blind as all that my eyes. (They're not mine, mine are done. They don't even weep any more, they open and shut by the force of habit - fifteen minutes exposure, fifteen minutes shutter, like the owl cooped in the grotto in Battersea Park.)

  Ah misery! Will I never stop wanting a life for myself?

  No no, no head either: anything you like, but not a head. In his head he doesn't go anywhere either, I've tried. (Lashed to the stake, blindfold, gagged to the gullet, you take the air - under the elms in se, murmuring Shelley - impervious to the shafts.)

  Yes a head - but solid: solid bone. And you imbedded in it, like a fossil in the rock. Perhaps there go I after all. I can't go on in any case. But I must go on. So I'll go on. Air! Air, I'll seek air: air in time, the air of time. And in space, in my head. That's how I'll go on.

  All very fine - but the voice is failing. It's the first time. No, I've been through that: it has even stopped, many a time. That's how it will end again. I'll go silent, for want of air, then the voice will come back and I'll begin again. (‘My voice’? ‘The voice’?) I hardly hear it any more.

  I'm going silent. Hearing this voice no more, that's what I call going silent. That is to say I'll hear it still, if I listen hard. I'll listen hard. (Listening hard, that's what I call going silent.) I'll hear it still, broken, faint, unintelligible, if I listen hard. (Hearing it still, without hearing what it says, that's what I call going silent.) Then it will flare up, like a kindling fire, a dying fire (Mahood explained that to me), and I'll emerge from silence. (Hearing too little to be able to speak, that's my silence.) That is to say I never stop speaking - but sometimes too low, too far away, too far within, to hear. (No, I hear: to understand. Not that I ever understand).

  It fades. It goes in, behind the door. I'm going silent, there's going to be silence. I'll listen, it's worse than speaking (no: no worse, no better). Unless this time it's the true silence, the one I'll never have to break any more, when I won't have to listen any more, when I can dribble in my corner, my head gone, my tongue dead. The one I have tried to earn, that I thought I could earn.

  I'm going to stop - that's to say I'm going to look as if I had (it will be like everything else). As if anyone were looking at me! As if it were I! It will be the same silence, the same as ever, murmurous with muted lamentation: panting and exhaling of impossible sorrow, like distant
laughter. And brief spells of hush, as of one buried before his time. Long or short, the same silence. Then I resurrect and begin again. That's what I'll have got for my pains.

  Unless this time it's the real silence at last! Perhaps I've said the thing that had to be said (that gives me the right to be done with speech, done with listening, done with hearing) without my knowing it. I'm listening already, I'm going silent. The next time I won't go to such pains: I'll tell one of Mahood's old tales (no matter which, they are all alike). They won't tire me. I won't bother any more about me. I'll know that no matter what I say the result is the same: that I'll never be silent, never at peace.

  Unless I try once more (just once more, one last time), to say what has to be said, about me (I feel it's about me, perhaps that's the mistake I make, perhaps that's my sin), so as to have nothing more to say, nothing more to hear, till I die. It's coming back. I'm glad. I'll try again. Quick before it goes again!

  Try what? I don't know. To continue?

  Now there is no one left. (That's a good continuation.) No one left? It's embarrassing. If I had a memory it might tell me that this is a sign of the end: this having no one left, no one to talk to, no one to talk to you, so that you have to say: "It's I who am doing this to me, I who am talking about me." Then the breath fails, the end begins, you go silent. It's the end (short-lived). You begin again. You had forgotten: there's someone there, someone talking to you (about you, about him). Then a second, then a third. Then the second again. Then all three together (these figures just to give you an idea), talking to you (about you, about them). All I have to do is listen. Then they depart, one by one, and the voice goes on. It's not theirs: they were never there. There was never anyone but you, talking to you about you. The breath fails, it's nearly the end. The breath stops, it's the end (short-lived). I hear someone calling me, it begins again. (That must be how it goes, if I had a memory.)