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Overview
Since the mid-1950s, when the works of Samuel Beckett began to attract sustained critical attention, commentators have tended either to dismiss his oeuvre as nihilist or defend it as anti-nihilist. On the one side are figures such as Georg Lukacs; on the other, some of the most influential philosophers and literary theorists of the post-war era, from Theodor Adorno to Alain Badiou. Taking as his point of departure Nietzsche's description of nihilism as the 'uncanniest of all guests', Weller calls this critical tradition into question, arguing that the relationship between Beckett's texts and nihilism is one that will always be missed by those who are simply for or against Beckett. (Legenda 2005)Synopsis
From first to last, argues Weller (English, St. Hilda's College, Oxford), Irish-born French playwright and novelist Beckett's art concerns itself with the thought of an end to what he himself once described as the suffering of being, but which can more accurately be called the suffering of ever-less-than-being. Distributed in the US by the David Brown Book Company. Annotation ©2004 Book News, Inc., Portland, OR
Book Details
Published
March 1, 2004
Publisher
Maney Publishing
Pages
256
Format
Paperback
ISBN
9781904713081