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Mercier and Camier
One of the most accessible examples of Samuel Beckett’s dark humor, Mercier and Camier is the hilarious chronicle of its two heroes’ epic journey. While their travels are fraught with complications and intrigue, Mercier and Camier at least “did not remove from home, they had that good fortune.”
128 pages, Paperback
First published January 1, 1970
58 people are currently reading
2093 people want to read
About the author
Samuel Beckett
918 books6,560 followersNovels of Samuel Barclay Beckett, Irish writer, include
Murphy
in 1938 and
Malone Dies
in 1951; a wider audience know his absurdist plays, such as
Waiting for Godot
in 1952 and
Krapp's Last Tape
in 1959, and he won the Nobel Prize of 1969 for literature.
Samuel Barclay Beckett, an avant-garde theater director and poet, lived in France for most of his adult life. He used English and French. His work offers a bleak, tragicomic outlook on human nature, often coupled with black gallows humor.
People regard most influence of Samuel Barclay Beckett of the 20th century. James Augustine Aloysius Joyce strongly influenced him, whom people consider as one modernist. People sometimes consider him as an inspiration to many later first postmodernists. He is one of the key in what Martin Esslin called the "theater of the absurd". His later career worked with increasing minimalism.
People awarded Samuel Barclay Beckett "for his writing, which—in new forms for the novel and drama—in the destitution of modern man acquires its elevation".
In 1984, people elected Samuel Barclay Bennett as Saoi of Aosdána.
Samuel Barclay Beckett, an avant-garde theater director and poet, lived in France for most of his adult life. He used English and French. His work offers a bleak, tragicomic outlook on human nature, often coupled with black gallows humor.
People regard most influence of Samuel Barclay Beckett of the 20th century. James Augustine Aloysius Joyce strongly influenced him, whom people consider as one modernist. People sometimes consider him as an inspiration to many later first postmodernists. He is one of the key in what Martin Esslin called the "theater of the absurd". His later career worked with increasing minimalism.
People awarded Samuel Barclay Beckett "for his writing, which—in new forms for the novel and drama—in the destitution of modern man acquires its elevation".
In 1984, people elected Samuel Barclay Bennett as Saoi of Aosdána.
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October 26, 2024
A friend’s eye is a good mirror.
Mercier and Camier are friends – they travel through the world and life together…
And this is the world they travel in:
Their paths cross and recross… They are inseparable like the opposites… They are indissoluble like happiness and unhappiness…
Friend in need is a friend indeed.
The journey of Mercier and Camier is one I can tell, if I will, for I was with them all the time.
Physically it was fairly easy going, without seas or frontiers to be crossed, through regions untormented on the whole, if desolate in parts. Mercier and Camier did not remove from home, they had that great good fortune. They did not have to face, with greater or less success, outlandish ways, tongues, laws, skies, foods, in surroundings little resembling those to which first childhood, then boyhood, then manhood had inured them.
Mercier and Camier are friends – they travel through the world and life together…
And this is the world they travel in:
It’s a great grey barracks of a building, unfinished, unfinishable, with two doors, for those who enter and for those who leave, and at the windows faces peering out.
Their paths cross and recross… They are inseparable like the opposites… They are indissoluble like happiness and unhappiness…
Let us go from here, said Mercier.
Where? said Camier.
Crooked ahead, said Mercier.
Our things? said Camier.
Less said the better, said Mercier.
You’ll be my death, said Camier.
Friend in need is a friend indeed.
Read
February 14, 2023I’ve never known a review to have so many false starts.
I finished Mercier et Camier a month ago and was full of ideas for the review, some of which I scribbled in the back of the book. Then I went on a trip and the book was left behind along with the ideas. I set about writing the review again when I got back two weeks later but the ideas I had scribbled in the book no longer made sense so I gave up and wrote a review of a book I’d read on the trip instead. A couple of days later, I began the review of Mercier et Camier again. A paragraph of nonsense resulted and I abandoned it and reviewed yet another book I’d read in the meantime. It seemed that the book and the review were destined to keep missing each other.
Today, I was determined to stop beating about the bush and to finally keep my appointment with Camier and Mercier, the two characters whose journey is the theme of this book. I thought I’d simply start at the beginning of their story and tell you of the excitement they felt at finally setting out on their long-planned trip, an excitement that was however a little spoiled by them missing each other at the rendezvous point, and then because they were further delayed by a rainstorm so that they had to put off the trip till the next day. But they did set out eventually, after a few other false starts, and they took a bicycle, a raincoat, an umbrella and a bag of food along with them. Any or all of these items may have been stolen because our heroes may have been thieves in a former life. The bicycle gets left behind near the the first pub they meet on the way, the bag is abandoned soon after and, well, you’ll have to read the book yourself to find out about the adventures of the raincoat. As for the umbrella, it was a kind of divining rod, in the sense of a coin to toss. That’s a new idea isn’t it, tossing an umbrella to decide whether you’ll go in this direction or that direction. But that’s what M & C did, although the umbrella suffered in the process and was repaired by Helen, the 'any port in a storm’ person in this story. Helen isn’t a character in the real sense, she just gets mentioned, and you’re not surprised by that, are you, because really, when does a woman ever have a speaking part in a Beckett book? The answer is, as in the bible, not often.
As for speaking parts, Mercier and Camier have quite extensive ones in this novel because it is very like a play, and not just any play, no, it is very like Waiting for Godot in that the two heroes come and go a lot, and sit around quite a bit too, philosophising. And there’s a third person, a kind of Godot/Christ character who is never quite present but is not absent either. In fact, it is he who narrates the entire thing. The first line of the book says: The journey of Mercier and Camier is one I can tell, if I will, for I was with them all the time. But he is never mentioned again! Or perhaps he is. Watt, you ask? Yes, Watt is mentioned at the end and there’s a possibility he may be the third person. I have yet to read all of Watt so I don’t know for certain. But if it came to the toss of an umbrella, I’d bet on it pointing at Watt. (Edit: having long since finished Watt, I think the umbrella was right)
....................................................................................................
The original title of Mercier et Camier was ‘Le Voyage de Mercier et Camier autour du pot dans les bosquets de Bondy’ (Mercier and Camier's journey spent beating about the bushes in the Bondy woods (or something to that effect)). Bondy is a real forest near Paris famous for highwaymen in the past—it is implied that the two heroes themselves have been thieves in a former life. The English translation of the title was to be ‘The Pointless Voyage of Mercier and Camier into the Den of Thieves’ but Beckett didn’t like that version (it entirely misses the wordplay of the French title) and he shortened both titles to the present versions. This book was the first of Beckett’s work written originally in French. He said that he switched to French because for him, writing in French made it easier to write without style. Perhaps this was an exercise in stripping his writing down even further than he had before but perhaps it was also a recognition that French publishers were slightly more interested in his work than were English ones. He started Mercier et Camier in 1945, soon after finishing Watt. He had spent most of the war years living in the French countryside, and Mercier et Camier reflects that; it is full of descriptions of rural areas, once the two heroes finally get clear of the city they set out from.
The really important fact about Mercier et Camier that you should know, yes you, the invisible third presence in this review alongside me and the book, is that it is very funny, perhaps the funniest of Beckett’s works - certainly the funniest I’ve read so far.
There, I’ve done beating about the bush and have come to the point, finally.
I finished Mercier et Camier a month ago and was full of ideas for the review, some of which I scribbled in the back of the book. Then I went on a trip and the book was left behind along with the ideas. I set about writing the review again when I got back two weeks later but the ideas I had scribbled in the book no longer made sense so I gave up and wrote a review of a book I’d read on the trip instead. A couple of days later, I began the review of Mercier et Camier again. A paragraph of nonsense resulted and I abandoned it and reviewed yet another book I’d read in the meantime. It seemed that the book and the review were destined to keep missing each other.
Today, I was determined to stop beating about the bush and to finally keep my appointment with Camier and Mercier, the two characters whose journey is the theme of this book. I thought I’d simply start at the beginning of their story and tell you of the excitement they felt at finally setting out on their long-planned trip, an excitement that was however a little spoiled by them missing each other at the rendezvous point, and then because they were further delayed by a rainstorm so that they had to put off the trip till the next day. But they did set out eventually, after a few other false starts, and they took a bicycle, a raincoat, an umbrella and a bag of food along with them. Any or all of these items may have been stolen because our heroes may have been thieves in a former life. The bicycle gets left behind near the the first pub they meet on the way, the bag is abandoned soon after and, well, you’ll have to read the book yourself to find out about the adventures of the raincoat. As for the umbrella, it was a kind of divining rod, in the sense of a coin to toss. That’s a new idea isn’t it, tossing an umbrella to decide whether you’ll go in this direction or that direction. But that’s what M & C did, although the umbrella suffered in the process and was repaired by Helen, the 'any port in a storm’ person in this story. Helen isn’t a character in the real sense, she just gets mentioned, and you’re not surprised by that, are you, because really, when does a woman ever have a speaking part in a Beckett book? The answer is, as in the bible, not often.
As for speaking parts, Mercier and Camier have quite extensive ones in this novel because it is very like a play, and not just any play, no, it is very like Waiting for Godot in that the two heroes come and go a lot, and sit around quite a bit too, philosophising. And there’s a third person, a kind of Godot/Christ character who is never quite present but is not absent either. In fact, it is he who narrates the entire thing. The first line of the book says: The journey of Mercier and Camier is one I can tell, if I will, for I was with them all the time. But he is never mentioned again! Or perhaps he is. Watt, you ask? Yes, Watt is mentioned at the end and there’s a possibility he may be the third person. I have yet to read all of Watt so I don’t know for certain. But if it came to the toss of an umbrella, I’d bet on it pointing at Watt. (Edit: having long since finished Watt, I think the umbrella was right)
....................................................................................................
The original title of Mercier et Camier was ‘Le Voyage de Mercier et Camier autour du pot dans les bosquets de Bondy’ (Mercier and Camier's journey spent beating about the bushes in the Bondy woods (or something to that effect)). Bondy is a real forest near Paris famous for highwaymen in the past—it is implied that the two heroes themselves have been thieves in a former life. The English translation of the title was to be ‘The Pointless Voyage of Mercier and Camier into the Den of Thieves’ but Beckett didn’t like that version (it entirely misses the wordplay of the French title) and he shortened both titles to the present versions. This book was the first of Beckett’s work written originally in French. He said that he switched to French because for him, writing in French made it easier to write without style. Perhaps this was an exercise in stripping his writing down even further than he had before but perhaps it was also a recognition that French publishers were slightly more interested in his work than were English ones. He started Mercier et Camier in 1945, soon after finishing Watt. He had spent most of the war years living in the French countryside, and Mercier et Camier reflects that; it is full of descriptions of rural areas, once the two heroes finally get clear of the city they set out from.
The really important fact about Mercier et Camier that you should know, yes you, the invisible third presence in this review alongside me and the book, is that it is very funny, perhaps the funniest of Beckett’s works - certainly the funniest I’ve read so far.
There, I’ve done beating about the bush and have come to the point, finally.
March 19, 2025
Vanity, vanity, saith the preacher. ALL is vanity.
Ecclesiastes
Sure, we know (by the time we are elderly) that all our efforts hitherto have been vain! So it goes: the world is still on tenterhooks, as we were in our youth. We can’t rise above this madness, no matter how much we’d like to.
Self Transcendence is a Dodo when you’re nearly eighty.
‘Get a loada this agony!’ says your Arthritis; ‘Ya think that’s bad, try this!’ says your old stomach, in pain from that pizza; and ‘Think you can remember his name!?’ mocks your departing memory of a close friend. You get the idea…
But, wait!!! THAT, says Beckett, will Stop this Macabre Cavalcade.
LAUGH it off, friends, he says.
***
For Beckett - like the more nondescript me in this department - had grimly won the Nobel.
At his advanced age (also like me) the laughs were few and far between.
What to do? His springs were dry. His publisher needed a New Book!
Then a Light Bulb went on: play a joke on yourself, you grumpy old man.
Dig out that old warhorse, Mercier and Camier (get it? AKA Mercy and the Calm of Peace) that you wrote after VE Day, 1945, and give the bloodhounds THAT!
And soon after followed this ‘new’ book.
***
Well, fraud is as fraud does. Rereading it a lifetime later, he was now nauseated.
He went to Morocco and drank himself a storm (you can still see the furious photo on Google) upon accepting the Nobel.
When he and his better half returned to the gossip mill in his Paris apartment building, he was probably on a Gravol binge to settle his nausea as he reread and revised.
And the result was a truncated ghost of its former self when done.
He liked it (though supping with his devils using a long spoon) and musta laffed. What you see is what you get. No escaping the pure raw immediacy of the present!
***
Vanity IS vanity, but Sam Beckett had successfully shown the world its true face:
And blackly chuckled all the while at it sotto voce.
What’s NOT to laugh about in this weird ugly new world that places no value on lifelong love and friendship, after all?
It’s a mockery.
Ecclesiastes
Sure, we know (by the time we are elderly) that all our efforts hitherto have been vain! So it goes: the world is still on tenterhooks, as we were in our youth. We can’t rise above this madness, no matter how much we’d like to.
Self Transcendence is a Dodo when you’re nearly eighty.
‘Get a loada this agony!’ says your Arthritis; ‘Ya think that’s bad, try this!’ says your old stomach, in pain from that pizza; and ‘Think you can remember his name!?’ mocks your departing memory of a close friend. You get the idea…
But, wait!!! THAT, says Beckett, will Stop this Macabre Cavalcade.
LAUGH it off, friends, he says.
***
For Beckett - like the more nondescript me in this department - had grimly won the Nobel.
At his advanced age (also like me) the laughs were few and far between.
What to do? His springs were dry. His publisher needed a New Book!
Then a Light Bulb went on: play a joke on yourself, you grumpy old man.
Dig out that old warhorse, Mercier and Camier (get it? AKA Mercy and the Calm of Peace) that you wrote after VE Day, 1945, and give the bloodhounds THAT!
And soon after followed this ‘new’ book.
***
Well, fraud is as fraud does. Rereading it a lifetime later, he was now nauseated.
He went to Morocco and drank himself a storm (you can still see the furious photo on Google) upon accepting the Nobel.
When he and his better half returned to the gossip mill in his Paris apartment building, he was probably on a Gravol binge to settle his nausea as he reread and revised.
And the result was a truncated ghost of its former self when done.
He liked it (though supping with his devils using a long spoon) and musta laffed. What you see is what you get. No escaping the pure raw immediacy of the present!
***
Vanity IS vanity, but Sam Beckett had successfully shown the world its true face:
And blackly chuckled all the while at it sotto voce.
What’s NOT to laugh about in this weird ugly new world that places no value on lifelong love and friendship, after all?
It’s a mockery.
January 18, 2025
4.5
One does what one can, but one can nothing. Only squirm and wriggle, to end up in the evening where you were in the morning.
One tall, one short, Camier and Mercier are two middle aged men who decide to go on a journey. Right from the beginning, it seems to the reader that they have a destination in mind and that they are looking for something.
They have a sack, a raincoat, an umbrella and apparently a bicycle, each of which they abandon along the way.
The reader doesn’t know who Camier or Mercier are or how they came to know each other; whence they come from and whither they are going.
What are they looking for?
Does what they are looking for even exist?
Will they eventually arrive at their destination?
The day has dawned at last, said Camier, after years of shilly-shally, when we must go, we know not whither, perhaps never to return … alive. We are simply waiting for the day to lift, then full speed ahead.
Written in 1946, Mercier and Camier is Beckett’s first effort at writing prose in the French language. Beckett refused to publish it at the time and it remained thus, until 1970.
One does what one can, but one can nothing. Only squirm and wriggle, to end up in the evening where you were in the morning.
One tall, one short, Camier and Mercier are two middle aged men who decide to go on a journey. Right from the beginning, it seems to the reader that they have a destination in mind and that they are looking for something.
They have a sack, a raincoat, an umbrella and apparently a bicycle, each of which they abandon along the way.
The reader doesn’t know who Camier or Mercier are or how they came to know each other; whence they come from and whither they are going.
What are they looking for?
Does what they are looking for even exist?
Will they eventually arrive at their destination?
The day has dawned at last, said Camier, after years of shilly-shally, when we must go, we know not whither, perhaps never to return … alive. We are simply waiting for the day to lift, then full speed ahead.
Written in 1946, Mercier and Camier is Beckett’s first effort at writing prose in the French language. Beckett refused to publish it at the time and it remained thus, until 1970.
June 25, 2018
Written in 1946, 'Mercier and Camier' was Samuel Beckett's first postwar novel and his first in French. He has better work out there, but for the Beckett connoisseur it's well worth a read.
He captures this time of depression and indecision in his own life. It continues the line of vagabond heroes like 'Murphy' and 'Watt.' They are the first of his vaudevillian couples, and this novel is in many ways the precursor of "Waiting for Godot." If there is a chronological line of development in his writing, 'Mercier and Camier' surely marks the first tentative approach toward what Beckett calls the mature fiction of 'Molloy,' 'Malone Dies' and 'The Unnamable.' In the trilogy, Beckett relentlessly reduces his characters from pitiful creatures with few possessions--a hat, a pot, a stub of pencil--to voices, who have only the inner torments of their past life to sustain their present existence, doomed to repeat themselves until finally, even the voice, their last vestige of humanity, is stilled. There is no discernible setting, no tie with any real existence, and seemingly, no plot.
The journey here shapes the plot as two men parade on an endless quest. Despite its somberness, it is in some ways a warm and funny book, occasionally tinged with stinging sarcasm. There are secondary characters, skillfully and swiftly delineated, so bizarre that even the two oddities of the title are struck by their madness. Mercier and Camier are otherworldly figures themselves, but they need the trappings of the real world in order to give their story coherence, and this is no doubt part of the reason why Beckett chose to abandon them and go on to the Malones and Malloys of his later fiction. 'Mercier and Camier' stands on the threshold of Beckett's mature fiction. There are large chunks of dialogue which he later transferred directly into Godot, and the voluntary exile theme echoes Beckett's own.
Not his best, but a decent read.
He captures this time of depression and indecision in his own life. It continues the line of vagabond heroes like 'Murphy' and 'Watt.' They are the first of his vaudevillian couples, and this novel is in many ways the precursor of "Waiting for Godot." If there is a chronological line of development in his writing, 'Mercier and Camier' surely marks the first tentative approach toward what Beckett calls the mature fiction of 'Molloy,' 'Malone Dies' and 'The Unnamable.' In the trilogy, Beckett relentlessly reduces his characters from pitiful creatures with few possessions--a hat, a pot, a stub of pencil--to voices, who have only the inner torments of their past life to sustain their present existence, doomed to repeat themselves until finally, even the voice, their last vestige of humanity, is stilled. There is no discernible setting, no tie with any real existence, and seemingly, no plot.
The journey here shapes the plot as two men parade on an endless quest. Despite its somberness, it is in some ways a warm and funny book, occasionally tinged with stinging sarcasm. There are secondary characters, skillfully and swiftly delineated, so bizarre that even the two oddities of the title are struck by their madness. Mercier and Camier are otherworldly figures themselves, but they need the trappings of the real world in order to give their story coherence, and this is no doubt part of the reason why Beckett chose to abandon them and go on to the Malones and Malloys of his later fiction. 'Mercier and Camier' stands on the threshold of Beckett's mature fiction. There are large chunks of dialogue which he later transferred directly into Godot, and the voluntary exile theme echoes Beckett's own.
Not his best, but a decent read.
December 20, 2022
Alone he watched the sky go out, dark deepen to its full. He kept his eyes on the engulfed horizon, for he knew from experience what last throes it was capable of. And in the dark he could hear better too, he could hear the sounds the long day had kept from him, human murmurs for example, and the rain on the water.
(photograph by Wolf Suschitzky)
(photograph by Wolf Suschitzky)
February 19, 2023
U popunjavanju Beket-rupa, ova je
za pedalj-do-dva prethodeća "Godou", klasičan reductio ad absurdum zez-geg:
- s klimavo-glibavim dijalozima - monolozima u paru - koji (naizgled) ne vode nikuda;
- i traženo-ispražnjenim stilom bez stila, otud i pisana na francuskom umesto maternjeg;
- s amnezično-aporičnim pripovedanjem i elipsastim pražnjenjima (šifra: voleš li Handkea s "Golmanom"!);
- uz bonus: nakon svaka dva poglavlja dobija se kratkocrtaški podsetnik koji nije umesno preletati jer, em ne pospešuje zatrpavanje mnemoničkih rupa (pročitati romanče iznova ali samo putem tih prepričavalačko-sapetih sekvenci), em sadrži niz fazona i fora (recimo: potkrade se tu i tamo i poneka izostavljena deonica, zamrzelo pripovedača da je narativizacijom priopći!);
- tipičnim klovnovskim dvojcem bez kormilara (visoki-suvonjavi : niski-punački : slepac vuče slepca) koji niotkuda ide u nikuda, i obratno. Ili: teško je napustiti Dablin, još teže se u njega vratititi;
- oskudnim rekvizitarijumom lica (tu i tamo čuvar parka, tu i tamo madam, poneko lice iz drugijeh proznih komadeški, pokoji mrtav pandur, krčmar, prolaznik) i predmeta (u potrazi za torbom, kišobranom, bajsom)...
za pedalj-do-dva prethodeća "Godou", klasičan reductio ad absurdum zez-geg:
- s klimavo-glibavim dijalozima - monolozima u paru - koji (naizgled) ne vode nikuda;
- i traženo-ispražnjenim stilom bez stila, otud i pisana na francuskom umesto maternjeg;
- s amnezično-aporičnim pripovedanjem i elipsastim pražnjenjima (šifra: voleš li Handkea s "Golmanom"!);
- uz bonus: nakon svaka dva poglavlja dobija se kratkocrtaški podsetnik koji nije umesno preletati jer, em ne pospešuje zatrpavanje mnemoničkih rupa (pročitati romanče iznova ali samo putem tih prepričavalačko-sapetih sekvenci), em sadrži niz fazona i fora (recimo: potkrade se tu i tamo i poneka izostavljena deonica, zamrzelo pripovedača da je narativizacijom priopći!);
- tipičnim klovnovskim dvojcem bez kormilara (visoki-suvonjavi : niski-punački : slepac vuče slepca) koji niotkuda ide u nikuda, i obratno. Ili: teško je napustiti Dablin, još teže se u njega vratititi;
- oskudnim rekvizitarijumom lica (tu i tamo čuvar parka, tu i tamo madam, poneko lice iz drugijeh proznih komadeški, pokoji mrtav pandur, krčmar, prolaznik) i predmeta (u potrazi za torbom, kišobranom, bajsom)...
September 19, 2025
Γεννήθηκες..
Ένα προσχέδιο του «Περιμένοντας τον «Γκοντό», περιφραστικότερο αλλά ίσως καλύτερο του.
Και εδώ οι χαρακτήρες περιφέρονται σαν μηχανικά αυτόματα, ο μηχανισμός υπεύθυνος για την επιλογή κατεύθυνσης έχει αχρηστευθεί, μπορεί εκούσια.
Η σύνοψη του βιβλίου - που θα μπορούσε να βρίσκεται στο οπισθόφυλλο, βρίσκεται ήδη στη σελίδα 27:
“Από τη συζήτησή τους προέκυψαν εις πείσμα όλων, μεταξύ άλλων, τα εξής.
1. Θα ήταν μάταιο, ούτε καν, παραφροσύνη, να συνεχίσουν προς το παρόν.
2. Το μόνο που έχουν να κάνουν είναι να ζητήσουν από την Ελένη να περάσουν τη νύχτα.
3. Τίποτα δεν τους εμποδίζει να ξεκινήσουν αύριο, με χαλάζι, με βροχή ή με λιακάδα, τα χαράματα.
4. Δεν υπάρχει λόγος να μέμφονται εαυτούς.
5. Αυτό που αναζητούν, υπάρχει;
6. Τι αναζητούν;
7. Δεν υπάρχει βιασύνη.
8. Οι αποφάσεις του σχετικά με την εκστρατεία απαιτούν αναθεώρηση, εν ηρεμία.
9. Ένα μόνο έχει σημασία: η αναχώρηση.
10. Στο διάολο όλα, ούτως ή άλλως. ”
- Πρωινό των πρωταθλητών, ομελέτα «Λεοπόλδος Μπλουμ»:
"Μερσιέ, τι συλλογάσαι;
Περί της φρίκης της υπάρξεως, ασαφώς πως, είπε ο Μερσιέ.
Τι θα ΄λεγες για ένα ποτό; Είπε ο Καμιέ."
The Velvet Underground, Nico -Sunday Morning
Ένα προσχέδιο του «Περιμένοντας τον «Γκοντό», περιφραστικότερο αλλά ίσως καλύτερο του.
Και εδώ οι χαρακτήρες περιφέρονται σαν μηχανικά αυτόματα, ο μηχανισμός υπεύθυνος για την επιλογή κατεύθυνσης έχει αχρηστευθεί, μπορεί εκούσια.
Η σύνοψη του βιβλίου - που θα μπορούσε να βρίσκεται στο οπισθόφυλλο, βρίσκεται ήδη στη σελίδα 27:
“Από τη συζήτησή τους προέκυψαν εις πείσμα όλων, μεταξύ άλλων, τα εξής.
1. Θα ήταν μάταιο, ούτε καν, παραφροσύνη, να συνεχίσουν προς το παρόν.
2. Το μόνο που έχουν να κάνουν είναι να ζητήσουν από την Ελένη να περάσουν τη νύχτα.
3. Τίποτα δεν τους εμποδίζει να ξεκινήσουν αύριο, με χαλάζι, με βροχή ή με λιακάδα, τα χαράματα.
4. Δεν υπάρχει λόγος να μέμφονται εαυτούς.
5. Αυτό που αναζητούν, υπάρχει;
6. Τι αναζητούν;
7. Δεν υπάρχει βιασύνη.
8. Οι αποφάσεις του σχετικά με την εκστρατεία απαιτούν αναθεώρηση, εν ηρεμία.
9. Ένα μόνο έχει σημασία: η αναχώρηση.
10. Στο διάολο όλα, ούτως ή άλλως. ”
- Πρωινό των πρωταθλητών, ομελέτα «Λεοπόλδος Μπλουμ»:
"Μερσιέ, τι συλλογάσαι;
Περί της φρίκης της υπάρξεως, ασαφώς πως, είπε ο Μερσιέ.
Τι θα ΄λεγες για ένα ποτό; Είπε ο Καμιέ."
The Velvet Underground, Nico -Sunday Morning
November 5, 2024
November 2024 reread:
On second thought, my favorite line may be spoken by the erstwhile Watt, however brief his reappearance in M&C:
“Fuck life!”
________________
You know that Kids in the Hall sketch with Jerry and Jerry, the Sizzler Sisters? McDonald and Foley play two escaped lunatics with a fondness for smeared lipstick and wigs, speaking in non-sequiturs and brandishing weaponry? This is sort of like a 126 page version of that, and it is glorious. Likely Beckett’s funniest novel, and right up there with his most mean-spirited.
To quote Sam: “Fuck along with you now!”
On second thought, my favorite line may be spoken by the erstwhile Watt, however brief his reappearance in M&C:
“Fuck life!”
________________
You know that Kids in the Hall sketch with Jerry and Jerry, the Sizzler Sisters? McDonald and Foley play two escaped lunatics with a fondness for smeared lipstick and wigs, speaking in non-sequiturs and brandishing weaponry? This is sort of like a 126 page version of that, and it is glorious. Likely Beckett’s funniest novel, and right up there with his most mean-spirited.
To quote Sam: “Fuck along with you now!”
May 3, 2023
A journey that leads nowhere...On The Road without any philosophical scaffolding...the Road to Oz with no yellow bricks. When I see homeless people just pushing their shopping carts around I think of this story. This is one of the books I recommend to people after they read Waiting for Godot; I think it helps you see Beckett in a different light.
August 20, 2022
“Do you feel like singing?”
“Not to my knowledge.”
This story is shaping up much better than How It Is I think it was called. I just could not read the word shit one more time. But this one is curious.
So yes this was an amalgamation of beckett’s various writing styles I think. It wasn’t too gross, and it makes you think.
“Not to my knowledge.”
This story is shaping up much better than How It Is I think it was called. I just could not read the word shit one more time. But this one is curious.
So yes this was an amalgamation of beckett’s various writing styles I think. It wasn’t too gross, and it makes you think.
January 28, 2014
Let's see. When I write reviews of the books that I've read but did not fully understand, I go to Google and read whatever reviews, articles or blogs that are available on line. I did not understand probably everything about this book. I do not know what it is trying to say unlike after I read the first two Beckett that I've read so far: Murphy (5 stars) and Watt (4 stars). Even prior to looking up those two books, I already knew what the plot was all about.
So let me write two reviews: one without a cheat sheet (Google), one with. Oh God, I won't be cheating.
Without Google
This is the story of two old men, Mercier and Camier. They are friends but they are opposites. Mercier is more aggressive, decisive and bossy while Camier is cool and mild-tempered. They are old and sickly. Mercier walks with the aid of a cane while Camier has a malignant cyst. They are not homosexual although they live together and sometimes hold hands while sleeping. The story revolves around them and they have very nice and profound conversations that have an air of philosophy and mystery in them and they are enough for me to like this book. I could not figure what's the meaning of those conversations but I am afraid that if I write here that they are meaningless, some of my Goodreads friends who have read the book will think that I am a moron because I did not understand Beckett. Also, Beckett won the Nobel Prize for Literature so giving a rating of less than 3 stars seems not right. Beckett is Beckett, you know.
Now I have to go to Google and see what's in there for me to write a more decent review...
With Google
This is the story of the 'pseudocouple' Mercier and his friend, private investigator Camier and their repeated attempts to live the city only to decide to return. They oftentimes visit "Helen's Place" that according to Wiki is modelled after an actual place that Beckett knew. There is (I forgot to mention this in my own honest review above) the cameo appearance of the houseboy Watt who is the main protagonist in Beckett's book, Watt that was published prior to this. According to the last page of the book, this was originally written in French in 1946 a year after "Watt." Initially accepted by Bordas (Paris) but was turned down after meager sales of the French translation of "Murphy." Beckett put this book aside and did not allow this to be published until 1970, the year after he won the Nobel Prize.
Hmmm, that's a more decent review complete with some trivia from Wiki. See how much difference Google can give to my review because I did not fully understand the book.
But hey, I did enjoy reading this one as I was figuring out all the time what was the real relationship of the two old men. Hah!
So let me write two reviews: one without a cheat sheet (Google), one with. Oh God, I won't be cheating.
Without Google
This is the story of two old men, Mercier and Camier. They are friends but they are opposites. Mercier is more aggressive, decisive and bossy while Camier is cool and mild-tempered. They are old and sickly. Mercier walks with the aid of a cane while Camier has a malignant cyst. They are not homosexual although they live together and sometimes hold hands while sleeping. The story revolves around them and they have very nice and profound conversations that have an air of philosophy and mystery in them and they are enough for me to like this book. I could not figure what's the meaning of those conversations but I am afraid that if I write here that they are meaningless, some of my Goodreads friends who have read the book will think that I am a moron because I did not understand Beckett. Also, Beckett won the Nobel Prize for Literature so giving a rating of less than 3 stars seems not right. Beckett is Beckett, you know.
Now I have to go to Google and see what's in there for me to write a more decent review...
With Google
This is the story of the 'pseudocouple' Mercier and his friend, private investigator Camier and their repeated attempts to live the city only to decide to return. They oftentimes visit "Helen's Place" that according to Wiki is modelled after an actual place that Beckett knew. There is (I forgot to mention this in my own honest review above) the cameo appearance of the houseboy Watt who is the main protagonist in Beckett's book, Watt that was published prior to this. According to the last page of the book, this was originally written in French in 1946 a year after "Watt." Initially accepted by Bordas (Paris) but was turned down after meager sales of the French translation of "Murphy." Beckett put this book aside and did not allow this to be published until 1970, the year after he won the Nobel Prize.
Hmmm, that's a more decent review complete with some trivia from Wiki. See how much difference Google can give to my review because I did not fully understand the book.
But hey, I did enjoy reading this one as I was figuring out all the time what was the real relationship of the two old men. Hah!
July 19, 2009
A living room. Conventional bachelor-pad squalor. Two listless figures are sprawled on the leather couch, a bag of Cool Ranch Doritos lying open between them. End of exposition.
Wanna play Wii? asked Camier.
Mercier brightened momentarily before relapsing into his accustomed hebetude.
I lack, he said, the vigour.
Come, come, said Camier. Why this pose of senescence? You’re a young man yet.
A gross libel, said Mercier. I was never young. I fell wizened and arthritic from my mater’s dusty womb.
On a sudden inspiration, Camier began to root about in his bulging pants’ pockets, disinterring and depositing on the coffee table a succession of oddments: a soiled napkin, a tin of breath mints, a Hello Kitty iPod case (empty), a bunch of Allen keys, a two-for-one voucher (expired) from a fast-food franchise. And whatnot. Finally he held aloft, daintily between thumb and forefinger, the charred nub of a marijuana cigarette.
Mercier, who had been observing these proceedings first with indifference, then with disgust and latterly with contempt, now twisted upwards the corners of his mouth, thus sketching a faint rictus which might, in other circumstances (a tooth extraction, say) have served as a smile.
No light, remember? said he. Unless you’re willing to walk to the kitchen.
At this, Camier suffered a nervous collapse, which precipitated a physical one.
You know very well, said he, coldly, having recruited himself somewhat, that I am in no condition to undertake such a journey.
What’ll we do then? asked Mercier.
Porn? offered Camier.
That’s all I need, scoffed Mercier. Another wasted erection.
You still get them? marvelled Camier, impressed in spite of himself. How quaint of you.
And so they went on, hour after hour, day after arse-paining day, each appallingly himself, the one biting into the exposed flesh of the other and being bitten in turn, out of habit, out of boredom, out of love, without hope of relief, but tenderly, always tenderly, until the putting off of life and the putting on of corruption, whenever that should be.
May 18, 2025
Beckett'in okuduğum beşinci kitabı, beğeni olarak Murphy'den sonra ikinci sıraya koyarım bunu.
Metin yine tam bir Beckett tarzı; varoluşun dehşeti, insanın absürtlüğü, anlamsızlık, nedensel bağdan kopmuş boşlukta insan.
Mercier ile Camier iki dost ihtiyarcık; biri şişman, kısa, sevimli diğeri ise uzun, zayıf, huysuz. Bir yere gitme 'çaba'sı içerisinde gibi görünen, amaçsızca bir yolculuk yapıyorlar. Yola çıkılamayan, çıkılsada az sonra geri dönmeye karar verilen, bu sırada tuhaf olaylar yaşayan, eşyalarını kaybeden, kendileride kaybolan, kararsız ve sevimli-sevimsiz iki ihtiyar delikanlının hikayesi. Ruh halleri; 'umuyor, korkuyor, yadsıyorlar', nereye götürüyor bu ayaklar bizi diye sorguluyorlar, sonra geri dönüş-vazgeçiş, yeniden başlama, kaçış, kaçışın sıkıntısı, kurtuluş düşleri...
Onlarla beraber dolanıp dolanıp bir yandanda düşünürken; insan kökenli budalalıklarımızı, insan yaşamının döngüsel ve anlamsız yönünü okuyoruz aslında.
İki dost dedim ama, -bir beden iki ruh- gibi bir algı veriyor birçok yerde, tek bilincin bölünmüş hali gibi içimizdeki id-ego ya da iyi-kötü. En azından ben öyle algıladım ama eminde değilim, zira Beckett'ta herşey o kadar belirsiz ve havadaki, kesin bir yorum yapabilmek imkansız ya da ben yapamıyorum.
Bu kitapta simgesel anlatımda hayli fazlaydı, kendimce yorumlarım;
bisiklet- insanın hayatta ki hareket yanılsaması, beceremeyişleri.
şemsiye- yakınlarımızı temsil ediyor sanki, kırıp kırıp tamir etmeye çalışmamızı!
yağmurluk- yaşam, fırlatıp atılmak istenen, cepleri gereksiz şeylerle dolu, yaşam yükü, her şekilde kullandılar onu.
bataklık- ne zaman düşüncelerinde çıkmaza girseler, ayakları çamura saplanıyor, burda solucanlarda var ama onlar sanki düşüncelerin kılıktan kılığa girip insanın zihninde dolanması olabilir, zihin kurdu!
Herkese keyifli okumalar.
...yerimde kalıp kılımı kıpırdatmayabilir, sonu gelmeyen yaklaşışa, sürüklenen adımlara ve çınlayan anahtarlara derman olarak feryatlardan, soluğun tıkanmalarından, sızlanmalardan, hayda'lardan daha iyi bir çare arıyor olabilirdim.syf99
düşüncelerinin bir özelliği de hangi dalga ve çalkantıyla oradan oraya sürüklenirse sürüklensinler, hiç değişmeden, hep aynı kayalıklara dönüp dönüp vurmalarıydı. Aslında belki de geçmiş ve geleceğin tek bir akıntıyla birbirine karıştığı ve ezelden beri, olmayan bir şimdinin üzerini örttüğü karanlık ve gürültülü bir düş niteliği taşıyordu bu düşünceler. İşte böyle.syf40
Beni terk etmek için birçok nedenin var, biliyorum, dedi Mercier. Bir an düşündü. İnsanın Mercier'yi bırakmaması için Camier olması gerek, dedi Mercier.syf74
kendini kuşatan zamanı belirtir, hep olan zamandır, hep olacak zamandır, çok gecikmiş güzelliklerle erken beliren çekicilikleri birleştiren zamandır, en ürkütücü bir kuzgundan daha korkunç olmayan bir zamandışı zamandır. Zaten bütün gün böyledir, saatin ilk tikinden son takına kadar, daha doğrusu üçüncü tikten, sondan bir öncekinden önceki taka kadar, çünkü göğsümüzdeki tamtamın bize düşü anımsatması ve düşten koparması için biraz zamana gereksinmesi vardır. Ama arada kalanların hepsini işitiriz, her düşen darı tanesini işitiriz, ardımıza bakar ve kendimizi görürüz, her defasında biraz daha yakın, tüm yaşam boyu biraz daha yakın.syf87
hiçbir şeyin olup bitmediğini, hiçbir şeyin yapılamayacağı ve hiçbir şeyin söylenemeyeceğini duyumsuyoruz mutlulukla. Çünkü insan sonunda itfaiyecinin hortumundan susuzluğunu gidermekten ve kendisine kalan birkaç mumun havanın ısısında birbiri ardından eridiğini görmekten yorulur. O zaman kendini sonsuza değin karanlık ve susuzluğa adar. Daha az yıpratıcıdır böylesi.syf97
adımlarını binbir dikkatle atarak, yaşam öylesine değerli, acılar öylesine korkutucu, beden öylesine yavaş onarıyor kendisini; tek bir sözcük etmeden ya da şükranını belirten bir harekette bulunmadan bu dost kaostan dışarı süzülüyor; insan teşekkürlerini sunmuyor taşlara, oysa haksızlık ediyor, sunmalı.syf115
Ocağın köşesinde, sıcakta ve rahat uykuya dalarlar, dedi Mercier. Kitap elden düşer, kafalar göğüs üzerinde, alevler ölgünleşir, kor solar, düşler mağaralarından çıkıp otlaklarına doğru süzülür. Ama nöbetçi uyanıktır, onlar uyanır, rüzgâr ve yağmur camları döverken, düşünceler, arı us, evsiz, garip, lanetli, zayıf ve talihsizler arasında dolaşıp dururken, Tanrı'ya, onlara onca insan arasında böylesine neşe, böylesi-ne huzur sağlayan Tanrı'ya, böylesine zahmetle elde ettikleri durumları için teşekkür ederek yatmaya giderler.syf96
Metin yine tam bir Beckett tarzı; varoluşun dehşeti, insanın absürtlüğü, anlamsızlık, nedensel bağdan kopmuş boşlukta insan.
Mercier ile Camier iki dost ihtiyarcık; biri şişman, kısa, sevimli diğeri ise uzun, zayıf, huysuz. Bir yere gitme 'çaba'sı içerisinde gibi görünen, amaçsızca bir yolculuk yapıyorlar. Yola çıkılamayan, çıkılsada az sonra geri dönmeye karar verilen, bu sırada tuhaf olaylar yaşayan, eşyalarını kaybeden, kendileride kaybolan, kararsız ve sevimli-sevimsiz iki ihtiyar delikanlının hikayesi. Ruh halleri; 'umuyor, korkuyor, yadsıyorlar', nereye götürüyor bu ayaklar bizi diye sorguluyorlar, sonra geri dönüş-vazgeçiş, yeniden başlama, kaçış, kaçışın sıkıntısı, kurtuluş düşleri...
Onlarla beraber dolanıp dolanıp bir yandanda düşünürken; insan kökenli budalalıklarımızı, insan yaşamının döngüsel ve anlamsız yönünü okuyoruz aslında.
İki dost dedim ama, -bir beden iki ruh- gibi bir algı veriyor birçok yerde, tek bilincin bölünmüş hali gibi içimizdeki id-ego ya da iyi-kötü. En azından ben öyle algıladım ama eminde değilim, zira Beckett'ta herşey o kadar belirsiz ve havadaki, kesin bir yorum yapabilmek imkansız ya da ben yapamıyorum.
Bu kitapta simgesel anlatımda hayli fazlaydı, kendimce yorumlarım;
bisiklet- insanın hayatta ki hareket yanılsaması, beceremeyişleri.
şemsiye- yakınlarımızı temsil ediyor sanki, kırıp kırıp tamir etmeye çalışmamızı!
yağmurluk- yaşam, fırlatıp atılmak istenen, cepleri gereksiz şeylerle dolu, yaşam yükü, her şekilde kullandılar onu.
bataklık- ne zaman düşüncelerinde çıkmaza girseler, ayakları çamura saplanıyor, burda solucanlarda var ama onlar sanki düşüncelerin kılıktan kılığa girip insanın zihninde dolanması olabilir, zihin kurdu!
Herkese keyifli okumalar.
...yerimde kalıp kılımı kıpırdatmayabilir, sonu gelmeyen yaklaşışa, sürüklenen adımlara ve çınlayan anahtarlara derman olarak feryatlardan, soluğun tıkanmalarından, sızlanmalardan, hayda'lardan daha iyi bir çare arıyor olabilirdim.syf99
düşüncelerinin bir özelliği de hangi dalga ve çalkantıyla oradan oraya sürüklenirse sürüklensinler, hiç değişmeden, hep aynı kayalıklara dönüp dönüp vurmalarıydı. Aslında belki de geçmiş ve geleceğin tek bir akıntıyla birbirine karıştığı ve ezelden beri, olmayan bir şimdinin üzerini örttüğü karanlık ve gürültülü bir düş niteliği taşıyordu bu düşünceler. İşte böyle.syf40
Beni terk etmek için birçok nedenin var, biliyorum, dedi Mercier. Bir an düşündü. İnsanın Mercier'yi bırakmaması için Camier olması gerek, dedi Mercier.syf74
kendini kuşatan zamanı belirtir, hep olan zamandır, hep olacak zamandır, çok gecikmiş güzelliklerle erken beliren çekicilikleri birleştiren zamandır, en ürkütücü bir kuzgundan daha korkunç olmayan bir zamandışı zamandır. Zaten bütün gün böyledir, saatin ilk tikinden son takına kadar, daha doğrusu üçüncü tikten, sondan bir öncekinden önceki taka kadar, çünkü göğsümüzdeki tamtamın bize düşü anımsatması ve düşten koparması için biraz zamana gereksinmesi vardır. Ama arada kalanların hepsini işitiriz, her düşen darı tanesini işitiriz, ardımıza bakar ve kendimizi görürüz, her defasında biraz daha yakın, tüm yaşam boyu biraz daha yakın.syf87
hiçbir şeyin olup bitmediğini, hiçbir şeyin yapılamayacağı ve hiçbir şeyin söylenemeyeceğini duyumsuyoruz mutlulukla. Çünkü insan sonunda itfaiyecinin hortumundan susuzluğunu gidermekten ve kendisine kalan birkaç mumun havanın ısısında birbiri ardından eridiğini görmekten yorulur. O zaman kendini sonsuza değin karanlık ve susuzluğa adar. Daha az yıpratıcıdır böylesi.syf97
adımlarını binbir dikkatle atarak, yaşam öylesine değerli, acılar öylesine korkutucu, beden öylesine yavaş onarıyor kendisini; tek bir sözcük etmeden ya da şükranını belirten bir harekette bulunmadan bu dost kaostan dışarı süzülüyor; insan teşekkürlerini sunmuyor taşlara, oysa haksızlık ediyor, sunmalı.syf115
Ocağın köşesinde, sıcakta ve rahat uykuya dalarlar, dedi Mercier. Kitap elden düşer, kafalar göğüs üzerinde, alevler ölgünleşir, kor solar, düşler mağaralarından çıkıp otlaklarına doğru süzülür. Ama nöbetçi uyanıktır, onlar uyanır, rüzgâr ve yağmur camları döverken, düşünceler, arı us, evsiz, garip, lanetli, zayıf ve talihsizler arasında dolaşıp dururken, Tanrı'ya, onlara onca insan arasında böylesine neşe, böylesi-ne huzur sağlayan Tanrı'ya, böylesine zahmetle elde ettikleri durumları için teşekkür ederek yatmaya giderler.syf96
December 17, 2020
Second reading went even better than that which with it was preceded by and bye...
And hello.
Mercier and Camier tells a relatively simple story w/a lack of story. It mostly comprises of various vignettes detailing an odd, unstructured journey taken upon by two funny, sad, weird, and classically Beckettian. Bleak, blackly hilarious, devastatingly sad as it comes to a short awaited close. It is Beckett at his near best. Or best. Depending on your outlook, I suppose.
Mercier and Camier are both absurd wanderers of day and night, constantly forgetting but nearly never regretting. Their journey is told mostly in dialogue which is occasionally interrupted, most mainly and noticeably more towards the end of the novel (or novella, possibly more slightly accurately (somewhat, or should I say someWatt in reference to another brilliant Beckett black comedy, which is actually a welcomed part of this novel(la) when the two heroes stumble upon the weirdly Watt himself)), by various, semi-lengthy passages of a streamly nature in relation to the consciousness, stylistically.
And hello.
Mercier and Camier tells a relatively simple story w/a lack of story. It mostly comprises of various vignettes detailing an odd, unstructured journey taken upon by two funny, sad, weird, and classically Beckettian. Bleak, blackly hilarious, devastatingly sad as it comes to a short awaited close. It is Beckett at his near best. Or best. Depending on your outlook, I suppose.
Mercier and Camier are both absurd wanderers of day and night, constantly forgetting but nearly never regretting. Their journey is told mostly in dialogue which is occasionally interrupted, most mainly and noticeably more towards the end of the novel (or novella, possibly more slightly accurately (somewhat, or should I say someWatt in reference to another brilliant Beckett black comedy, which is actually a welcomed part of this novel(la) when the two heroes stumble upon the weirdly Watt himself)), by various, semi-lengthy passages of a streamly nature in relation to the consciousness, stylistically.
November 1, 2017
Perhaps the most pleasurable little read in all of Beckett's oeuvre, Mercier and Camier is a brutally bleak and hysterically funny little romp. Only the expat from Foxrock could come up with such a perfectly mid-20th-century mixture of fear, loathing, and Devil-may-care glee. It's a perfectly cut little gem of a book: by turns lyrical, self-deprecating, bleak, even brutal in one scene, and all the while peppered with truly funny witticisms and clever double entendres (plus an orgy! If sex in three counts as an orgy that is). What the hell more could you ask from a novel? Less than 200 pages? You got it! How's about a brief synopsis every two chapters so I can easily review what I've just read. No problem at all. The author is happy to oblige.
For all of the above I'm giving it the full 5 stars even if I have one small criticism. The novel does, stylistically, cover a bit of the same ground as Murphy, which wouldn't bother me at all had monsieur Beckett made a career out of only writing absurdist humor, but I had thought that "First Love" and the three stories from Stories and Texts for Nothing to have begun charting new vistas--those incessant voices of the trilogy of novels to come, the loss of the intrusive narrator, the growing subtlety of the humor, making the bleakness less silly and more darkly absurd and therefore disturbing--and I had praised him in my reviews of those texts for having moved on after the near-perfection of the style in Murphy. Here, however, there's a slight return to the obtrusive third person narrator who claims to have been there at the text's opening but is never anywhere to be found. There's also a kind of coda in the last chapter--did S. B. feel compelled to make their number come out even so as to retain the pattern of the synopses?--in which Watt appears and even recalls Murphy by name. It wasn't really necessary and is not the novel's strongest section. Perhaps Mercier and Camier is the true finale of Beckett's first period, the novels Dream of Fair to Middling Women, Murphy, Mercier and Camier, and the excerpts and stories collected into More Pricks than Kicks. (Note the odd reliance on the m and k sounds, something there I think--I wonder what?)
At any rate 1946 was a terrific year for our boy as he capped his early darkly humorous style with this little gem, got started on the new style of interior monologue that he would follow into the early 1950s in three fabulous novels also named after men with second initial M., and--as you may have assumed from the two names making up the title here--had already hit on the dramatic device of absurdist dialogues between a pair of inert old fossils trying to decide what to do and where to go, which he would repeat in Waiting for Godot, and which would make him an international sensation. A very good year indeed.
For all of the above I'm giving it the full 5 stars even if I have one small criticism. The novel does, stylistically, cover a bit of the same ground as Murphy, which wouldn't bother me at all had monsieur Beckett made a career out of only writing absurdist humor, but I had thought that "First Love" and the three stories from Stories and Texts for Nothing to have begun charting new vistas--those incessant voices of the trilogy of novels to come, the loss of the intrusive narrator, the growing subtlety of the humor, making the bleakness less silly and more darkly absurd and therefore disturbing--and I had praised him in my reviews of those texts for having moved on after the near-perfection of the style in Murphy. Here, however, there's a slight return to the obtrusive third person narrator who claims to have been there at the text's opening but is never anywhere to be found. There's also a kind of coda in the last chapter--did S. B. feel compelled to make their number come out even so as to retain the pattern of the synopses?--in which Watt appears and even recalls Murphy by name. It wasn't really necessary and is not the novel's strongest section. Perhaps Mercier and Camier is the true finale of Beckett's first period, the novels Dream of Fair to Middling Women, Murphy, Mercier and Camier, and the excerpts and stories collected into More Pricks than Kicks. (Note the odd reliance on the m and k sounds, something there I think--I wonder what?)
At any rate 1946 was a terrific year for our boy as he capped his early darkly humorous style with this little gem, got started on the new style of interior monologue that he would follow into the early 1950s in three fabulous novels also named after men with second initial M., and--as you may have assumed from the two names making up the title here--had already hit on the dramatic device of absurdist dialogues between a pair of inert old fossils trying to decide what to do and where to go, which he would repeat in Waiting for Godot, and which would make him an international sensation. A very good year indeed.
Read
October 15, 2017"Sie hielten sich an den äußersten Rand Rand des Bürgersteigs, Mercier vorne, mit der Hand an der Lenkstange, Camier hinten, mit der Hand auf dem Sattel, und das Fahrrad an ihrer Seite rutschte am Rinnstein entlang.
Du hinderst mich mehr, als daß du mir hilfst, sagte Mercier.
Ich versuche gar nicht, dir zu helfen, sagte Camier, ich versuche, mir selbst zu helfen.
Dann ist ja alles gut, sagte Mercier." (27)
"Als sie wieder auf der Straße waren, packten sie einander am Arm. Nach einigen hundert Metern machte Mercier Camier darauf aufmerksam, daß sie nicht im Gleichschritt gingen.
Du hast deinen Rhythmus, sagte Camier, und ich habe meinen.
Ich mache uns keine Vorwürfe, sagte Mercier. Es ist jedoch ermüdend. Man kommt nur so ruckweise voran.
Mir wäre lieber, sagte Camier, wenn du mich geradeheraus und ohne Umschweife darum bätest, entwender deinen Arm loszulassen und wegzugehen oder mich deinem Zickzackkurs zu fügen." (31)
Die kopulierenden Hunde hat ein natürlicher Trieb verbunden, auch sie kamen auf komische Weise nicht auseinander. Was bindet C&M aneinander?
'The raincoat, said Camier, why not dump it? What good is it?
It retards the action of the rain, said Mercier.
A cerecloth, said Camier.
You go too far, said Mercier.
Do you want my honest opinion? said Camier. The one who has it on is no less to be pitied, physically and morally, than the one who has it off.
There's something in what you say, said Mercier.'
Du hinderst mich mehr, als daß du mir hilfst, sagte Mercier.
Ich versuche gar nicht, dir zu helfen, sagte Camier, ich versuche, mir selbst zu helfen.
Dann ist ja alles gut, sagte Mercier." (27)
"Als sie wieder auf der Straße waren, packten sie einander am Arm. Nach einigen hundert Metern machte Mercier Camier darauf aufmerksam, daß sie nicht im Gleichschritt gingen.
Du hast deinen Rhythmus, sagte Camier, und ich habe meinen.
Ich mache uns keine Vorwürfe, sagte Mercier. Es ist jedoch ermüdend. Man kommt nur so ruckweise voran.
Mir wäre lieber, sagte Camier, wenn du mich geradeheraus und ohne Umschweife darum bätest, entwender deinen Arm loszulassen und wegzugehen oder mich deinem Zickzackkurs zu fügen." (31)
Die kopulierenden Hunde hat ein natürlicher Trieb verbunden, auch sie kamen auf komische Weise nicht auseinander. Was bindet C&M aneinander?
'The raincoat, said Camier, why not dump it? What good is it?
It retards the action of the rain, said Mercier.
A cerecloth, said Camier.
You go too far, said Mercier.
Do you want my honest opinion? said Camier. The one who has it on is no less to be pitied, physically and morally, than the one who has it off.
There's something in what you say, said Mercier.'
February 7, 2017
Mercier and Camier is a relatively early story by Beckett but shows how much talent this writer had even at this incipient stage of his career.
The characters Mercier and Camier are typically Beckettian, which means they stand a snowball's chance on the surface of the sun in 'civilised society'. They are like a vaudevillian version of Laurel and Hardy without a place in the world. Beckett is the champion of the misfits' cause and his dark humour is really at its very best in this short novel.
If it weren't for the very dark humour which brings some levity to the darkness of the stories, the prose, the characters, the stories would be hopelessly pessimistic and depressing.
What are these two looking for? We are not quite sure. And neither are they. But the fact that they are searching, moving, going somewhere, just for the sake of it, is the whole point. And Beckett's whole point, in not only this work but throughout his whole oeuvre it seems is that there is no point....to life. Or what is the point? And what does it matter anyway if we do something, if we go something, if we try....
There is a forlorn notes that rings clear and sad through these pages which is at times beautiful, funny, stark, haunting and even devastating.
Beckett is one of the most brilliant writers I have ever read. He is as intelligent as Joyce but the vocabulary is much easier than Joyce on the lay reader. Highly highly recommended.
The characters Mercier and Camier are typically Beckettian, which means they stand a snowball's chance on the surface of the sun in 'civilised society'. They are like a vaudevillian version of Laurel and Hardy without a place in the world. Beckett is the champion of the misfits' cause and his dark humour is really at its very best in this short novel.
If it weren't for the very dark humour which brings some levity to the darkness of the stories, the prose, the characters, the stories would be hopelessly pessimistic and depressing.
What are these two looking for? We are not quite sure. And neither are they. But the fact that they are searching, moving, going somewhere, just for the sake of it, is the whole point. And Beckett's whole point, in not only this work but throughout his whole oeuvre it seems is that there is no point....to life. Or what is the point? And what does it matter anyway if we do something, if we go something, if we try....
There is a forlorn notes that rings clear and sad through these pages which is at times beautiful, funny, stark, haunting and even devastating.
Beckett is one of the most brilliant writers I have ever read. He is as intelligent as Joyce but the vocabulary is much easier than Joyce on the lay reader. Highly highly recommended.
November 18, 2012
Call it Beckett's version of "Bouvard and Pecuchet" with choreography by Buster Keaton - philosophical slapstick spiced up with some orgies and a brutal murder. This series of set pieces is somewhat slight by design, but the writing is fast paced, gorgeously wrought, and often laugh out loud funny. It's Mr. B having a lark - even dropping in guest appearances from Watt and Murphy - which is half the fun in itself.
November 4, 2014
مرسیه و کامیه
ساموئل بکت
پویان غفاری
نشر افراز
ساموئل بکت انچنان مشهور است و انقدر در مورد نمایشنامه هایش بحث صورت گرفته که لزومی به تکرار ان مطالب نیست ولی انچه که به طور معمول از بکت نمیدانیم این است که او علاوه بر نمایشنامه نویسی ،رمان نویسی قهارنیز بود و سه گانه (مالوی،مالون می میرد و نام ناپذیر)شاهدی بر این مدعاست .اوج خلاقیت بکت در دهه پنجاه و اوایل دهه ۶۰بود و پس از ان حجم و کیفیت اثارش به شدت کم شد ولی در اخر دهه ۷۰میلادی،رمانی مربوط به سالهای دهه ۴۰ او به چاپ رسید که همگان را شگفتزده کرد .رمانی به معنای واقعی پست مدرنیستی و دقیقا مرتبط با حال و هوای دهه ۷۰.هر چند خود بکت از این رمان به عنوان نسخه اولیه در انتظار گودو که در سال ۱۹۵۳به چاپ رسید نام میبرد.
مرسیه و کامیه رمانیست در مورد دو پیرمرد اسمان جل که میخواهند سفر کنند اما هدف از سفر روشن نیست!میخواهند به ملاقات کسی بروند ولی نمیدانند ان شخص کیست و کجاست!فضای رمان ازجنس ژاک قضا و قدری اثر دیدرو ست و مکان ها و مطالب در راستای همان کتاب است البته از نوع ابزورد !
در پایان هر دو فصل ،فصلی با عنوان خلاصه دو فصل قبل وجود دارد که نزدیک به ۱۰۰کلمه در ان است وتمامی لغات کلیدی دو فصل قبل است و با خواندن همین جند کلمه حتی تمامی چیزی که خوانده ایم از ذهن پاک میشود.کتاب بسیار عجیب و غریب است و با معیارهای امروز هم بسیار تجربی و اوانگارد جلوه میکند.خواندن این کتاب به نسبت ساده تر از سه گانه را به تمامی دوستداران دو آتشه بکت(که خودم هم از انها هستم)توصیه میکنم.
بخشهایی از کتاب:
سفر مرسیه وکامیه را اگر بخواهم،میتوانم تعریف کنم ،چون تمام مدت با انها بودم.سفری بدون دریاها و بدون گذشتن از مرزها ،از میان مناطق کمتر ناهموار ،هر چند که در بعضی جاها بیابانی،اسباب و وسایلشان به قدر کفایت ساده بود.انها،مرسیه و کامیه ،در خانه شان ماندند ،و این شانس بسیار گرانبها را داشتند .از کم اقبالی یا خوش اقبالی ،مجبور نبودند که با یک اداب و رسوم بیگانه و یک زبان و یک مقررات و یک غذای عجیب و غریب رو برو شوند،ان هم در محیطی که از نظر شباهت ،کمترین ارتباط را با ان چیزی داشت که ابتدا سن جوانی و بعد سن پیری ،انها را در مقابلش مقاوم می کرد
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مرسیه گفت چرا مدام به درخت پشت سر نگاه میکنی؟(کامیه بارانیش را به درخت اویزان کرده تو این جای کتاب)
کامیه گفت:کی ؟اره؟بله بارانی ام دارد دستمالش را تکان میدهد.
مرسیه گفت:نکند چیزی توی جیبهایش جا گذاشته باشیم.
کامیه گفت:انواع و اقسام بلیت های سوراخشده ،اثار قرار ملاقات های قطعی به انجام نرسیده روی تکه های حاشیه روزنامه،اخرین اثر از ده اثر کلاسیکی که با یک مداد نازک نوک شکسته نوشته شده اند،چند برگ دستمال توالت کثیف،چند کاندوم و بالاخره مقداری کرد خاک.تمامی یک زندگی.
مرسیه گفت :به هیچ کدام نیازی نداریم؟
کامیه گفت:برای همین به تو میگویم تمامی یک زندگی.
ساموئل بکت
پویان غفاری
نشر افراز
ساموئل بکت انچنان مشهور است و انقدر در مورد نمایشنامه هایش بحث صورت گرفته که لزومی به تکرار ان مطالب نیست ولی انچه که به طور معمول از بکت نمیدانیم این است که او علاوه بر نمایشنامه نویسی ،رمان نویسی قهارنیز بود و سه گانه (مالوی،مالون می میرد و نام ناپذیر)شاهدی بر این مدعاست .اوج خلاقیت بکت در دهه پنجاه و اوایل دهه ۶۰بود و پس از ان حجم و کیفیت اثارش به شدت کم شد ولی در اخر دهه ۷۰میلادی،رمانی مربوط به سالهای دهه ۴۰ او به چاپ رسید که همگان را شگفتزده کرد .رمانی به معنای واقعی پست مدرنیستی و دقیقا مرتبط با حال و هوای دهه ۷۰.هر چند خود بکت از این رمان به عنوان نسخه اولیه در انتظار گودو که در سال ۱۹۵۳به چاپ رسید نام میبرد.
مرسیه و کامیه رمانیست در مورد دو پیرمرد اسمان جل که میخواهند سفر کنند اما هدف از سفر روشن نیست!میخواهند به ملاقات کسی بروند ولی نمیدانند ان شخص کیست و کجاست!فضای رمان ازجنس ژاک قضا و قدری اثر دیدرو ست و مکان ها و مطالب در راستای همان کتاب است البته از نوع ابزورد !
در پایان هر دو فصل ،فصلی با عنوان خلاصه دو فصل قبل وجود دارد که نزدیک به ۱۰۰کلمه در ان است وتمامی لغات کلیدی دو فصل قبل است و با خواندن همین جند کلمه حتی تمامی چیزی که خوانده ایم از ذهن پاک میشود.کتاب بسیار عجیب و غریب است و با معیارهای امروز هم بسیار تجربی و اوانگارد جلوه میکند.خواندن این کتاب به نسبت ساده تر از سه گانه را به تمامی دوستداران دو آتشه بکت(که خودم هم از انها هستم)توصیه میکنم.
بخشهایی از کتاب:
سفر مرسیه وکامیه را اگر بخواهم،میتوانم تعریف کنم ،چون تمام مدت با انها بودم.سفری بدون دریاها و بدون گذشتن از مرزها ،از میان مناطق کمتر ناهموار ،هر چند که در بعضی جاها بیابانی،اسباب و وسایلشان به قدر کفایت ساده بود.انها،مرسیه و کامیه ،در خانه شان ماندند ،و این شانس بسیار گرانبها را داشتند .از کم اقبالی یا خوش اقبالی ،مجبور نبودند که با یک اداب و رسوم بیگانه و یک زبان و یک مقررات و یک غذای عجیب و غریب رو برو شوند،ان هم در محیطی که از نظر شباهت ،کمترین ارتباط را با ان چیزی داشت که ابتدا سن جوانی و بعد سن پیری ،انها را در مقابلش مقاوم می کرد
¥¥¥¥¥¥¥¥¥¥¥¥¥¥¥¥¥¥¥
مرسیه گفت چرا مدام به درخت پشت سر نگاه میکنی؟(کامیه بارانیش را به درخت اویزان کرده تو این جای کتاب)
کامیه گفت:کی ؟اره؟بله بارانی ام دارد دستمالش را تکان میدهد.
مرسیه گفت:نکند چیزی توی جیبهایش جا گذاشته باشیم.
کامیه گفت:انواع و اقسام بلیت های سوراخشده ،اثار قرار ملاقات های قطعی به انجام نرسیده روی تکه های حاشیه روزنامه،اخرین اثر از ده اثر کلاسیکی که با یک مداد نازک نوک شکسته نوشته شده اند،چند برگ دستمال توالت کثیف،چند کاندوم و بالاخره مقداری کرد خاک.تمامی یک زندگی.
مرسیه گفت :به هیچ کدام نیازی نداریم؟
کامیه گفت:برای همین به تو میگویم تمامی یک زندگی.
September 20, 2011
Now we must choose, said Mercier.
Between what? said Camier.
Ruin and collapse, said Mercier.
Could we not somehow combine them? said Camier.
Dominated as it is by its despairing comedic dialogues and voyages to nowhere, I took this (seeing the 1970 publication date) to be something of a Godot rehash. On the contrary, its a pre-hash, composed just after Watt in 1946, Beckett's first in French, with the goal of erasing style. Yet the mastery of style seen in Watt was part of what drew me to it. Mercier and Camier does exude a style of its own, dismal/playful flouishes, some marvelous gags and descriptions, but it still isn't quite up to the ambition of Watt before it or the focus of Godot afterwards. But Beckett is Beckett, as always, and that is enough.
July 3, 2012
A gem from the master of metaphysical and absurd-ism lit, this short and delightful novel was written by Beckett when he was just cutting his teeth on the style that would become his hallmark. I wonder how many times Stoppard read this before writing Rosencrantz and Guildenstern are Dead. Funny, brutal and original throughout.
I picked this up at Powell's in Portland over the weekend. For my Goodreads friends that haven't heard of this greatest of bookstores, it is a beacon of light in a world of box-store bookstores. An entire city block in Portland dedicated to one house of the written word (used and new volumes galore). Check them out at powells.com
I picked this up at Powell's in Portland over the weekend. For my Goodreads friends that haven't heard of this greatest of bookstores, it is a beacon of light in a world of box-store bookstores. An entire city block in Portland dedicated to one house of the written word (used and new volumes galore). Check them out at powells.com
April 29, 2020
خواندن «مرسیه و کامیه»، که از اولین آثار نویسندهست، با وجود ناپختگیای که نسبت به دیگر آثار بکت، در عناصر داستان دارد، برای من تجربهی خیلی خوبی بود. خصوصا ویژگی خاص سبک پستمدرن یعنی راوی غیرمعتمد به پررنگی هرچه تمامتر در داستان حس میشد؛ جاییکه روای میگوید:«مرسیه و کانیه آن محل را نمیشناختند. همین ترغیبشان میکرد تا آنجا با هم قرار بگذارند. ما هم هنوز بعضی چیزها را با قطعیت نمیدانیم!»
این عدم قطعیت و و عدم پیوستگی تعمدی داستان مثل اشاره به شخصیتهای یا جزئیات بیاهمیت_صرفا برای گمراه کردن خواننده_ که نقشی در داستان ندارند٬ در عین حال که ممکن است باعث دلزدگی از داستان شود، از نظر من ویژگی مثبت اثر است.
این عدم قطعیت و و عدم پیوستگی تعمدی داستان مثل اشاره به شخصیتهای یا جزئیات بیاهمیت_صرفا برای گمراه کردن خواننده_ که نقشی در داستان ندارند٬ در عین حال که ممکن است باعث دلزدگی از داستان شود، از نظر من ویژگی مثبت اثر است.
February 4, 2020
It turns out I really like Beckett! Mercier and Camier was his third work I read. It was quite different from the other two Worstward Ho and Malone Dies. The story was often absurd but also really funny, not something I had imagined Beckett to be. I'm really looking forward to reading more of his work!
March 31, 2021
Beckett'ın acıklı durumları alaya alabilme erdemi ile yoğurduğu bir karamizah örneği...
Mercier ve Camier'in bir kenti terk etmek üzere buluşamamalarıyla başlayan romanda bu iki yaşlının başlarına gelen garip olayları, garip düşüncelerini, karşılaştıkları garip karakterleri, bu yolculuğun karar veremedikleri amacına ilişkin trajikomik iletişimlerini okuyoruz. Söyleyeceklerim bu kadar. Zira Beckett pek anlatılabilecek bir yazar değil. Okuyunuz. Ya sever ya elinizden atarsınız. Benim zamanlama olarak tam da okumayı istediğim tarzda bir metindi💟
Mercier ve Camier'in bir kenti terk etmek üzere buluşamamalarıyla başlayan romanda bu iki yaşlının başlarına gelen garip olayları, garip düşüncelerini, karşılaştıkları garip karakterleri, bu yolculuğun karar veremedikleri amacına ilişkin trajikomik iletişimlerini okuyoruz. Söyleyeceklerim bu kadar. Zira Beckett pek anlatılabilecek bir yazar değil. Okuyunuz. Ya sever ya elinizden atarsınız. Benim zamanlama olarak tam da okumayı istediğim tarzda bir metindi💟
March 23, 2025
Ceea ce sufletul vomită nu-i nicicând pierdut.
Mercier și Camier (scrisă in '46 și publicată in '70) este un experiment stilistic care amintește de una dintre cele mai cunoscute capodopere teatrale ale lui Beckett, Așteptându-l pe Godot, datorită similarității dintre cele două perechi de personaje – Mercier și Camier, pe de o parte, și Gogo și Didi, pe de alta. Cei doi se hotărăsc să pornească într-o călătorie, dar acel „undeva” nu se va materializa niciodată. Călătoria lor devine un perpetuu dute-vino, captiv într-un labirint încărcat de semnificații și dialoguri ce reflectă universul beckettian. Un aspect interesant al cărții este structura sa, întrucât, la fiecare al treilea capitol, autorul rezumă în propoziții simple sau chiar cuvinte succinte evenimentele anterioare Mercier și Camier pleacă – Umbrela – Papagalul Ara – Cugetările lui Mercier – Ploaia pe fața lui Mercier – Mercier, Camier și Watt ...
Un alt element care mi-a atras atenția a fost apariția numelor Watt și Murphy, ce fac referire la titlurile altor două romane de Beckett, pe care sper să le citesc cândva sau cât de repede. :)))
Ce-ai putea spune despre viață care să nu fi fost deja spus? Multe. Că ochește rău din cur, de exemplu.
Mercier și Camier (scrisă in '46 și publicată in '70) este un experiment stilistic care amintește de una dintre cele mai cunoscute capodopere teatrale ale lui Beckett, Așteptându-l pe Godot, datorită similarității dintre cele două perechi de personaje – Mercier și Camier, pe de o parte, și Gogo și Didi, pe de alta. Cei doi se hotărăsc să pornească într-o călătorie, dar acel „undeva” nu se va materializa niciodată. Călătoria lor devine un perpetuu dute-vino, captiv într-un labirint încărcat de semnificații și dialoguri ce reflectă universul beckettian. Un aspect interesant al cărții este structura sa, întrucât, la fiecare al treilea capitol, autorul rezumă în propoziții simple sau chiar cuvinte succinte evenimentele anterioare Mercier și Camier pleacă – Umbrela – Papagalul Ara – Cugetările lui Mercier – Ploaia pe fața lui Mercier – Mercier, Camier și Watt ...
Un alt element care mi-a atras atenția a fost apariția numelor Watt și Murphy, ce fac referire la titlurile altor două romane de Beckett, pe care sper să le citesc cândva sau cât de repede. :)))
Ce-ai putea spune despre viață care să nu fi fost deja spus? Multe. Că ochește rău din cur, de exemplu.
April 30, 2012
خیلی عجیب!
خیلی جالب!
خیلی نو و تازه!
و خیلی چیزای دیگه ه.من سه کتاب پس باد همیه چیز را نخواهد برد اثر براتیگان،سفید برفی اثر دونالد بارتلمی واین کتاب رو رو پشت سرهم مطالعه کردم و در انتها به این نتیجه رسیدم که این کتاب از همه اونا تو ساختار پست مدرنسیتی تازه تره با اونکه خیلی قبل تر از اونا تو دهه 40د نوشته شده.شاید به خاطر نابهنگام بودن این اثر باشه که بکت اونو تودوره اوج رمان پست مدرنیستی تو دهه 70 چاپ کرد. یه جورایی نسخه دستنویس اولیه در انتظار گودو به نظر میاد.یه جورایی هم شبیه رمان مورد علاقه من ژاک قضا قدریه.به هر حال صفحه ای از این کتاب وجود نداره که منو به حیرت فرو نبرده باشه.نمونش تو همون صفحه 2 کتاب که در باره زمانبندیه با اون جدول عجیب.این کتاب رو به همه رمان خونای حرفه ای توصیه میکنم و به جای 5 ستاره بهش 6 ستاره میدم.
خیلی جالب!
خیلی نو و تازه!
و خیلی چیزای دیگه ه.من سه کتاب پس باد همیه چیز را نخواهد برد اثر براتیگان،سفید برفی اثر دونالد بارتلمی واین کتاب رو رو پشت سرهم مطالعه کردم و در انتها به این نتیجه رسیدم که این کتاب از همه اونا تو ساختار پست مدرنسیتی تازه تره با اونکه خیلی قبل تر از اونا تو دهه 40د نوشته شده.شاید به خاطر نابهنگام بودن این اثر باشه که بکت اونو تودوره اوج رمان پست مدرنیستی تو دهه 70 چاپ کرد. یه جورایی نسخه دستنویس اولیه در انتظار گودو به نظر میاد.یه جورایی هم شبیه رمان مورد علاقه من ژاک قضا قدریه.به هر حال صفحه ای از این کتاب وجود نداره که منو به حیرت فرو نبرده باشه.نمونش تو همون صفحه 2 کتاب که در باره زمانبندیه با اون جدول عجیب.این کتاب رو به همه رمان خونای حرفه ای توصیه میکنم و به جای 5 ستاره بهش 6 ستاره میدم.
April 7, 2025
som hvis en filosof fra 1800-tallet havde skrevet "dum og dummere" filmene
October 12, 2020
Mercier and Camier is a love story. I don't know how I missed it the first time. I was too young. They look like they may or not meet, but they do meet, they know each other too well not to. Each knows the other will be there, late, or not, each wanders back and forth, just in case, from the designated location, knowing the other will come.
They take that journey together, wherever, fated by whatever. They kill for each other, that poor constable, if only he’d known not to get in the way of lovers: their power when denied love is exponential.
Males bond, and we don’t read enough of it in literature. I don’t know why that is. Perhaps it’s either too difficult or unsettling or demeaned by one-dimensionality. But real male connection in literature is rare. Comic devices are needed to help the narrative along and help us accept whatever bond M & C have towards each other. I must read Godot again to see it’s there again. The two always seem to know how to respond to sentences as though of one mind.
Yes, love in whatever form: “And there were times they would look long at each other, unable to utter a word, their minds two blanks.”
Physical humour as connectedness: “Soon falls began to enter into play, now Camier accompanied Mercier (in his fall), now the reverse, and now the two collapsing simultaneously, as one man, without preconcertation, and in perfect interdependency.”
It’s kind of sweet, really.
There’s some lovely lines that stretch language and often grounded in the human and physical:
“Less rut-besotted, they would have thought of it themselves”
or
“when you fear your cyst, think of your fistula. And when you tremble for your fistula, consider your chancre”
The comic dialogue is wonderful:
I can’t stand there doing nothing, said Camier
Then let us sit, said Mercier.
Worst still, said Camier.
Only two people totally attached to each other, can fill their days with endless variety of conversation, dovetailing in and out of sense, situation and circumstance. Right to the end:
“Well, he said, I must go. Farewell Mercier
Sleep sound, said Mercier”
They take that journey together, wherever, fated by whatever. They kill for each other, that poor constable, if only he’d known not to get in the way of lovers: their power when denied love is exponential.
Males bond, and we don’t read enough of it in literature. I don’t know why that is. Perhaps it’s either too difficult or unsettling or demeaned by one-dimensionality. But real male connection in literature is rare. Comic devices are needed to help the narrative along and help us accept whatever bond M & C have towards each other. I must read Godot again to see it’s there again. The two always seem to know how to respond to sentences as though of one mind.
Yes, love in whatever form: “And there were times they would look long at each other, unable to utter a word, their minds two blanks.”
Physical humour as connectedness: “Soon falls began to enter into play, now Camier accompanied Mercier (in his fall), now the reverse, and now the two collapsing simultaneously, as one man, without preconcertation, and in perfect interdependency.”
It’s kind of sweet, really.
There’s some lovely lines that stretch language and often grounded in the human and physical:
“Less rut-besotted, they would have thought of it themselves”
or
“when you fear your cyst, think of your fistula. And when you tremble for your fistula, consider your chancre”
The comic dialogue is wonderful:
I can’t stand there doing nothing, said Camier
Then let us sit, said Mercier.
Worst still, said Camier.
Only two people totally attached to each other, can fill their days with endless variety of conversation, dovetailing in and out of sense, situation and circumstance. Right to the end:
“Well, he said, I must go. Farewell Mercier
Sleep sound, said Mercier”
September 24, 2018
Yet another work I feel conflicted about because although I am very partial to the ideas presented here, there’s something about Beckett's writing that throws me off and makes it hard for me to enjoy this short novel as much as I feel I should. I can’t blame it on the translation as Beckett himself translated it back to English from his original French text. Which is not to say I didn’t find humor in various passages. It’s just that the writing overall felt alienating in some way.
And yet I haven’t been able to stop thinking of Mercier and Camier because much like Bellow’s The Dangling Man the main ideas and thoughts that Beckett is trying to convey resonate with me on a deep level. Because much like The Dangling Man this seems to be a story about what happens when all assumptions and projects and beliefs that humans once held as given are seen to be non-existent. The basic anchor to hang this all on is Existentialism’s “God is Dead,” but this crisis in modern thought branches out to so much more than the strictly religious. This feels like Beckett’s absurd next step past Camus and Dostoevsky.
What happens to us when our drive to progress and proceed finds no solid direction to progress or proceed in?
At one time in our much distant past we must have felt perfectly alright to just exist without goals or beliefs or purpose, but this time is long gone. Religion and Science and Humanity’s Progress has ingrained in us a sense of purpose, enlightenment and drive, originally based on God, but then even on our own exalted sense of Humanism. And yet, what if the drive remains but no agreed upon or even discernible goal or foundation or "higher good” remains to be seen or believed in? What then?
Well, we might find ourselves wandering around aimlessly like Mercier and Camier!
And yet I haven’t been able to stop thinking of Mercier and Camier because much like Bellow’s The Dangling Man the main ideas and thoughts that Beckett is trying to convey resonate with me on a deep level. Because much like The Dangling Man this seems to be a story about what happens when all assumptions and projects and beliefs that humans once held as given are seen to be non-existent. The basic anchor to hang this all on is Existentialism’s “God is Dead,” but this crisis in modern thought branches out to so much more than the strictly religious. This feels like Beckett’s absurd next step past Camus and Dostoevsky.
What happens to us when our drive to progress and proceed finds no solid direction to progress or proceed in?
At one time in our much distant past we must have felt perfectly alright to just exist without goals or beliefs or purpose, but this time is long gone. Religion and Science and Humanity’s Progress has ingrained in us a sense of purpose, enlightenment and drive, originally based on God, but then even on our own exalted sense of Humanism. And yet, what if the drive remains but no agreed upon or even discernible goal or foundation or "higher good” remains to be seen or believed in? What then?
Well, we might find ourselves wandering around aimlessly like Mercier and Camier!
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