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Beckett's Dying Words: The Clarendon Lectures 1990 (Clarendon Lectures in English)
 
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Beckett's Dying Words: The Clarendon Lectures 1990 (Clarendon Lectures in English) (Paperback)

by Christopher Ricks (Author)
5.0 out of 5 stars  See all reviews (1 customer review)
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Product details

  • Paperback: 224 pages
  • Publisher: Oxford Paperbacks; New edition edition (9 Feb 1995)
  • Language English
  • ISBN-10: 0192824074
  • ISBN-13: 978-0192824073
  • Product Dimensions: 19.7 x 13.1 x 1.6 cm
  • Average Customer Review: 5.0 out of 5 stars  See all reviews (1 customer review)
  • Amazon.co.uk Sales Rank: 666,015 in Books (See Bestsellers in Books)

    Popular in these categories:

    #21 in  Books > Poetry, Drama & Criticism > History & Criticism > Key Critics > Ricks, Christopher
    #96 in  Books > Languages > By Language > Other European Languages > Celtic Languages > Welsh

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Product Description

Sunday Telegraph

`Ricks fascinates, teases and enriches our understanding'


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Ricks fascinates, teases and enriches our understanding (Sunday Telegraph )
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Beckett's Dying Words: The Clarendon Lectures 1990 (Clarendon Lectures in English)
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5.0 out of 5 stars vigour mortis, 11 Jan 2009
On the one hand, everyone knows that Beckett's work is important. On the other, it's doubtful that even the most literary-minded of us would say that we keep a copy of 'Malone Dies' for cosy bed-time reading. Beckett is often highly demanding and after all, most of his work is devoted to a single-minded confrontation with the one thing no one wants to think about (least of all in the wee small hours). As a saturnine, black-clad undergraduate I can remember brandishing a copy of the Trilogy in a seminar (I got half-way through it) only to be told by a tutor 'That won't cheer you up!'.

One of the great joys of Christopher Ricks' marvellous book is the way that he reveals a deeper truth in Beckett's vision. Beckett offers no palliative to the reality of our own mortality other than the uncomfortable idea that the possibility of existence never ending is a far more hellish alternative. Furthermore, the sheer vigour with which Beckett uses language to explore the rigours of existence is itself a triumph.

This is not a book that digs up the hoary old chestnuts of deconstruction. For too long, Beckett has been toted in academic-circles as the patron saint of the 'words words words' school of criticism. Ricks aims a few well-aimed broadsides at the idle musings of the post-structualists, in the process showing how the tragi-comic energy of Beckett's language stems precisely from it's reference to the real.

Ricks' little study is a shining example of what criticism SHOULD be. His feel for language is pretty much unparalleled(alright, perhaps by Frank Kermode). It's testament to his brilliance that he can spend two pages teasing out the connotations of Beckett's use of parantheses AND make it an exhilirating read.

Beckett's humour is often neglected, or seen merely in the context of existentialism- here it is rarely out of the foreground. Ricks convincingly links Beckett to Swift's satirical work and spends a great deal of time toying with the absurdly antithetical definitions and etymologies of some of Beckett's word choices. The last chapter on the 'irish bull' is both fascinating and hilarious and Ricks himself can't help slipping in his own Beckettian mots justes.

It's physically a slight little book, but it's more than worth the cover price (alright - why are academic books so expensive these days?!!!). If you care about literature, this deserves a place on your shelf.
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