So, here's a question for you. You should all try to answer this, right here in this blog:
Based on what we've discussed about modernism and postmodernism in class and what you've gleaned from the readings, do you consider Beckett's Molloy to be predominantly modern or postmodern? And what is at stake in this question? Does Beckett bring about the "end of the novel" or does he find a new way of playing with the novel form? What do you see as the differences between modernism and postmodernism in general?
"I write novels that imitate the form of the novel, by an author who imitates the role of Author."
- John Barth, author of Lost in the Funhouse
4 comments:
Well, the reason I haven't posted anything is because these dicussion questions are flying over my head, breaking Mach speeds.
Let's take the Modern versus Postmodern question. I grabbed the Hassan handout that had the "schematics" for Mo/Pomo on it and arbitrarily picked 4 comparisons.
#1 - Heirarchy versus Anarchy.
Molloy just barely remembers his own name--or does he just think that?--and cannot for the life of him remember what town he is from, what town he is, where he is going, or what direction he is headed.
Looking at the pages up untill 124 it just looks like total anarchy, with the exception of having punctuation; a decision that seemed very surprising to me. His thoughts are constant contradictions, second and third guesses. But I wouldn't go so far to call the book anarchy.
Molloy is living within a world of heirarchy. His run ins with the police (the police being a huge indicator of anti-anarchy), being taken in by Lousse who from the patchy descriptions is clearly wealthy show two points of societal heirarchy.
Funny though, that Molloy himself is in a constant state of lack of order, although he can see order around him, he knows full well he will never truly be part of it, nor does he seem to care, or strive to be part of it. Yet being harassed by policemen and such show the reader that even though mentally he is anarchy, he still has to live in the confines of a heirarchal power.
I do also understand that Heirarchy/Anarchy in the terms of the "schematics" does not mean society within the story per se. So far up untill page 124, I'm not catching too much structure. Heirarchy within the book? No.
Anarchy within the book? ...noo.
More like the typewriter ramblings of an idiot-savante that just read too much Kerouac.
#2 Hypotaxis versus Parataxis
If you look on wikipedia for Parataxis, Beckett is actual a main example for it in literature.
Considering I had to look up the meaning of Parataxis I'll fill you in. It's short things. Simple sentences. Like this. Got it?
Read a page from this book... Parataxis? YEP!
#3 Interpretation/Reading vs Against Interpretation/Misreading
Molloy himself seems to have an extremely difficult time interpreting the world around him, and presents the reader with what I feel are just his thoughts, rattling off beligerently. I also feel though, there's little more I can do as a reader but to just bobble along with Molloy's thoughts and simultaneously misread and misinterpret the world alongside of him.
I declare this one a draw for Mo vs PoMo.
#4 Paranoia vs Schizophrenia
"Schizophrenia is a psychiatric diagnosis that describes a mental illness characterized by impairments in the perception or expression of reality, most commonly manifesting as auditory hallucinations, paranoid or bizarre delusions or disorganized speech and thinking in the context of significant social or occupational dysfunction"
Disorganized speech and thinking? In Molloy? Naaaahh!!
Think of anytime the man is questioned about anything. Has he hallucinated or became delusional at any points? It's hard to even say, considering (from my stance) that we're in his mind. A crazy person doesn't question their sanity, although he has remarked many times that he isn't totally all there mentally.
So called "negative" symptoms of schizophrenia include lack of emotion [something Molloy has barely shown any of even talking about his own mother, his life, killing Lousse's dog, and especially when Lousse first asked him to stay for company he just kept interrupting and asking what town he was in.], lack of speech [definitely], anhedonia [gaining no positive feeling from good things, like eating, social interaction, sex. All things Molloy has exhibite no feelings towards, including describing "attacking" his food, not really caring if he was screwing his grandmother in the ass or the vagina, basically having no social skill at all.]
He never really seems paranoid though. He just does his Molloy things.
I've been reading for the past hour and a half and then just wrote all that. Let's just say that I think these four have proved Molloy to be in the PoMo realm moreso than modernism.
"Does Beckett bring about the end of the novel?" I don't know. I've only read half of one of his books. He's certainly doing something different than Charles Dickens, and that is ALWAYS the right thing to do.
The differences I see in Post Modernism from Modernism... mainly it's Form verses Anti-Form and the PoMo Metanarrative.
It's pretty Anti-Form to go with the purest form there is--which is used in the first half of Molloy--strictly lines. Considering that the modernists tried to do sooo effing much with form, Beckett kinda just laughs and says "screw it" and doesn't hit "tab" once. It's very Kerouac "scroll" like. The free flowing of ideas onto the page, the insight of the mind, the pure thoughts, the pure form. The brain thinks and spits out lines in parataxis. We never indent our lines in our head do we?
I'm terrible at blogs. All the blogs i have, have one post and then i stare at them loathingly. I'll try to do a better job here.
More Modern or Postmodern? Well, i'd have to agree with Ryan and say it's more PoMo. I can completely understand why people would want to lump Beckett with Faulkner- especially after having glanced over Haslin's copy of The Sound and the Fury. It's jumbled and awkward and sometimes you're not sure why you're reading it. But with Faulkner, you are supposed to tease the mess apart, as the mess is to represent the workings of a mind (however abnormal that mind may be). You are supposed to come away with a meaning.
And perhaps Beckett's style is meant to capture the workings of Malloy's mind and that is a very Modernist tactic. I don't think, however, that Malloy has any meaning as such. There is no reason to pull it apart, as there is nothing besides a bum in a ditch. To me, he's making fun of Modernists- like saying, "here, see if you can unravel that one Wolfe. You were going in the right direction when the lighthouse didn't mean anything."
as for PoMo, i'd need to consult my list again (which i can't find *headdesk*) but the one that comes right to mind is low vs high art. I haven't read a great deal of literature from this era but what i have doesn't usually involve the discussion of farts and testicles- and it should, it was a great inclusion. Beckett loved to talk about anything pertaining to the ass. Well, if i had anal cysts... no, I don't think i'd want that to work it's way into my work. But that seems to me to be the sort of thing that wasn't quite so literary.
I guess I see it as Beckett did use form to better represent reality as a modernist would, but he represented the depthlessness of the postmodern world.
What I got from it, it seemed to me to be really stream of consciousness, but also metafiction because in the beginning Molloy talks about handing over the pages and getting them back with corrections. I'm at a loss. I don't know if it's postmodernism or modernism, or maybe pieces of both, but when I read it it seemed more like modernism to me, until I read the other comments. Anyway, he seemed more OCD than schizophrenic.
As for it being the end of the novel, I don't think it is. It may be hard to read with all the contemplation that goes in one ear and out the other when I read it, but it's still text, and it does follow a more or less linier path. I kept thinking "what if someone wrote something like this for a workshop?" It wouldn't be pretty.
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