Renegotiating Beckett's Fourth Wall: The Quietist Space as the Crucible for Tragedy in the Later Works

Identifier

109

Author

Carter Wenger

Date

2017

Document Type

Honors Thesis

Degree Name

Bachelor of Arts

Major

English

Concentration

Literary and Cultural Studies

Committee Chair

Carey James Mickalites

Abstract

In the following thesis, entitled "Renegotiating Beckett's Fourth Wall: The Quietist Space as the Crucible for Tragedy in the Later Works," I argue that metadramatic readings of Beckett's theatre misrepresent the author's thematic and dramaturgical cornerstones. This is largely due to the incessant canonization of the early plays Waiting for Godot and Endgame, and further, the circulation of potentially problematic manuscripts (early drafts, essentially) of these two plays, which differ from revised scripts Beckett used as a director. Using the editorial history of these plays as a foreground, Beckett scholars are given a much clearer view of the inward-turning trajectory of Beckett's dramatic compositions. I then explore Beckett's study and adaptation of the seventeenth-century theological movement, "quietism," in the formulation of his own unique dramaturgical structure. In effect, applied as an interpretive key, quietism offers scholars a powerful tool in Beckett studies that demands attention, as it is forcefully adaptable both in his drama and his prose.

Comments

Undergraduate Honor's Thesis

Library Comment

Honors thesis originally submitted to the Local University of Memphis Honor’s Thesis Repository.

Recommended Citation

Wenger, Carter, "Renegotiating Beckett's Fourth Wall: The Quietist Space as the Crucible for Tragedy in the Later Works" (2017). Honors Theses. 66.
https://digitalcommons.memphis.edu/honors_theses/66