Model
Digital Document
Publisher
Florida Atlantic University
Description
An historical profile of semantics, general semantics, and
the philosophy of language in the 1920's and 1930's situates
Beckett's work both philosophically and historically. In
Molloy Beckett portrays the paradoxical nature of human language
as both enlightenment and imprisonment, our sole vehicle
for reasoning, but constituting in itself a limitation
upon reasoning, as well as self-knowledge. The novel as a
whole is about this unbearable gap between experience and
expression, the essentially averbal self and language. This
study traces, through the examination of events and changing
levels of discourse in Molloy, the exact process by which
the characters Molloy and Moran begin to perceive the existence
of a separate reality beyond the reach of language.
the philosophy of language in the 1920's and 1930's situates
Beckett's work both philosophically and historically. In
Molloy Beckett portrays the paradoxical nature of human language
as both enlightenment and imprisonment, our sole vehicle
for reasoning, but constituting in itself a limitation
upon reasoning, as well as self-knowledge. The novel as a
whole is about this unbearable gap between experience and
expression, the essentially averbal self and language. This
study traces, through the examination of events and changing
levels of discourse in Molloy, the exact process by which
the characters Molloy and Moran begin to perceive the existence
of a separate reality beyond the reach of language.
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