A narrator in the edge: the pathway of beckettian first person narrator from the \nouvelles\ to the \textes pour rien\

Author(s)

Lívia Bueloni Gonçalves

• Document type: Master's Dissertation
• Press: São Paulo.
• Institution: Universidade de São Paulo (USP). Faculdade de Filosofia, Letras e Ciências Humanas (FFLCH/SBD)
• Defense date: 2009-04-17

Examining board members

Fabio Rigatto de Souza Andrade; Fabio Akcelrud Durão; Ana Paula Sá e Souza Pacheco

• Advisor: Fabio Rigatto de Souza Andrade

Abstract

This dissertation studies the narrator in Samuel Beckett s prose, particularly focusing on a critical phase in the authors literary production covering the years of 1945 to 1950. The chosen period begins with the novellas Premier Amour (1970), Lexpulsé, Le calmant and La fin (1955) Becketts first narratives written in French and closes with the work Textes pour rien (1955). The importance of this phase lies in the creation and development of Becketts characteristic first person narrator, whose unstable discourse is fraught with impasses, questioning the very story being narrated. The dissertation follows this narrators journey to discuss the key role it played in breaking with formal realism patterns of the twentieth centurys narrative. (AU)