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(Book Jacket Status: Jacketed)
The first novel of Samuel Beckett's mordant and exhilarating midcentury trilogy introduces us to Molloy, who has been mysteriously incarcerated, and who subsequently escapes to go discover the whereabouts of his mother. In the latter part of this curious masterwork, a certain Jacques Moran is deputized by anonymous authorities to search for the aforementioned Molloy. In the trilogy's second novel, Malone, who might or might not be Molloy himself, addresses us with his ruminations while in the act of dying. The third novel consists of the fragmented monologue–delivered, like the monologues of the previous novels, in a mournful rhetoric that possesses the utmost splendor and beauty–of what might or might not be an armless and legless creature living in an urn outside an eating house. Taken together, these three novels represent the high-water mark of the literary movement we call Modernism. Within their linguistic terrain, where stories are taken up, broken off, and taken up again, where voices rise and crumble and are resurrected, we can discern the essential lineaments of our modern condition, and encounter an awesome vision, tragic yet always compelling and always mysteriously invigorating, of consciousness trapped and struggling inside the boundaries of nature. --This text refers to an out of print or unavailable edition of this title.
The first novel of Samuel Beckett's mordant and exhilarating midcentury trilogy introduces us to Molloy, who has been mysteriously incarcerated, and who subsequently escapes to go discover the whereabouts of his mother. In the latter part of this curious masterwork, a certain Jacques Moran is deputized by anonymous authorities to search for the aforementioned Molloy. In the trilogy's second novel, Malone, who might or might not be Molloy himself, addresses us with his ruminations while in the act of dying. The third novel consists of the fragmented monologue–delivered, like the monologues of the previous novels, in a mournful rhetoric that possesses the utmost splendor and beauty–of what might or might not be an armless and legless creature living in an urn outside an eating house. Taken together, these three novels represent the high-water mark of the literary movement we call Modernism. Within their linguistic terrain, where stories are taken up, broken off, and taken up again, where voices rise and crumble and are resurrected, we can discern the essential lineaments of our modern condition, and encounter an awesome vision, tragic yet always compelling and always mysteriously invigorating, of consciousness trapped and struggling inside the boundaries of nature. --This text refers to an out of print or unavailable edition of this title.
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Customer Reviews
Most Helpful Customer Reviews
16 of 19 people found the following review helpful
Format:Paperback
Beckett, in these three novels, gives us a terrifying and hilarious masterclass in written English. Absolutely beautiful, quite indescribable poetry-in-prose. Must be read, with full attention, to be appreciated.
16 of 20 people found the following review helpful
Format:Hardcover
how anyone give Beckett's trilogy 1 star is beyond the limits of comprehension. It is my favourite book (especially the last installment, The Unnamable), and is absolutely mind-blowing.
It seems that both reviewers who find it unsatisfactory do so because of a gross misconception: that beckett's intention is to describe geriatric decline, or psychosis (indeed, the narrators are as far from archetypes as it is possible to be). This is simply not the case, and cruelly pigeonholes and misunderstands a work which concerns itself, really, with EVERYTHING. (oh, and if he were detailing his madness, as one reviewer seems to think, it would merely support the link between madness and genius!) As the reader progresses, all their assumptions about narrators, truth and the process of reading are undercut. reality and imagined scenarios blur, power relationships are confused...
i hope i am not making it seem grandiose or laborious (although you could never call it light reading). the texts appear aimless and digressive, but through their nothingness they challenge and inspire. maybe it's paradoxical, but through challenging all the devices of the novel form - ie plot, character, narrative - beckett creates one of the richest works i have ever read.
if this sounds too philosophical, don't be perturbed - the thing people tend to forget about Beckett is that he's actually really funny, in his sly way. i laughed out loud numerous times while reading the book. But most of all, Beckett's prose is simply beautiful. the imagining of his characters - who are delightfully idiosyncratic - are so vivid, elegiac and evocative.
So: mind-altering, funny, beautiful, and entirely unique. Sammy B, total legend. no wonder he won the nobel prize.
It seems that both reviewers who find it unsatisfactory do so because of a gross misconception: that beckett's intention is to describe geriatric decline, or psychosis (indeed, the narrators are as far from archetypes as it is possible to be). This is simply not the case, and cruelly pigeonholes and misunderstands a work which concerns itself, really, with EVERYTHING. (oh, and if he were detailing his madness, as one reviewer seems to think, it would merely support the link between madness and genius!) As the reader progresses, all their assumptions about narrators, truth and the process of reading are undercut. reality and imagined scenarios blur, power relationships are confused...
i hope i am not making it seem grandiose or laborious (although you could never call it light reading). the texts appear aimless and digressive, but through their nothingness they challenge and inspire. maybe it's paradoxical, but through challenging all the devices of the novel form - ie plot, character, narrative - beckett creates one of the richest works i have ever read.
if this sounds too philosophical, don't be perturbed - the thing people tend to forget about Beckett is that he's actually really funny, in his sly way. i laughed out loud numerous times while reading the book. But most of all, Beckett's prose is simply beautiful. the imagining of his characters - who are delightfully idiosyncratic - are so vivid, elegiac and evocative.
So: mind-altering, funny, beautiful, and entirely unique. Sammy B, total legend. no wonder he won the nobel prize.
27 of 34 people found the following review helpful
Format:Paperback
These three novels are the best of the 20th century.
They contain all the beauty, despair, and spareness that makes Beckett the patron writer of our century. They get at the core of what it means to be a self in the midst of the void, having, against one's will, a self's attendant thoughts, words, stories, and imagination. "I, say I. Unbelieving" says Beckett in the first line of The Unnamable, and you can believe him. These novels are as metaphysical as novels get, asking sincerely what it means to be. And asking just as sincerely if language can ever help us figure that out.
Each novel, with Molloy on his crutches, Malone in his death-bed, The Unnamable in his skull, is screamingly funny and cryingly horrible. Beckett's sense of the absurd and the ridiculous are only matched by his encyclopedic knowledge and overwhelming but strangely life-affirming pessimism, which helps us go on as we laugh at the world's collection of whimsies.
There are no novels better. There are few funnier. There are none containing more truth.
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Most Recent Customer Reviews
Beckett is cool!
For anyone thinking of buying this excellent book and approaching Beckett for the first time id say that like Kafka hes a existentialist writer which means his work deals with the... Read more
Published on 4 Dec 2008 by Mr. Ms. Tait
trivializes and debases the geriatric mind
Presumes to lay bare the geriatric mind, but comes nowhere near. Based on the ludicrous proposition that the aging process is hellish and unnatural. Read more
Published on 22 Aug 1999
THE TRILOGY THAT DESTROYS ITSELF
All the narrators-Molloy, Malone, the Unnameable-are schizophrenic, as G.C. Barnard has noted; however, Beckett is not investigating varieties of the illness. Read more
Published on 27 Jun 1999
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