"Say it simply [...] say it simplier" : Samuel Beckett and Gertrude Stein's aesthetics of writing worser

Abstract

While critics have long acknowledged the critical importance of Samuel Beckett's expressed desire in the Axel Kaun letter, dated July 9 1937, to tear at language as an indication of his changing aesthetics, they have tended to neglect the fact that Beckett specified he wished to do so in a manner akin to that already achieved by Gertrude Stein. This thesis redresses the critical lacuna that is Stein's role in Beckett's developing aesthetics by arguing for Stein's influence on Beckett's developing aesthetics of language and, in particular, on the evolution of his bilingual English writings. The thesis delineates the mutuality of Beckett and Stein's aesthetics of language and their creative praxes in English through a comparative study that encompasses major works from both authors' English oeuvres, focusing primarily on their fictional output. It traces and compares the trajectory of both authors' engagements with linguistic representation in English, and is specifically concerned with the technique of repetition and a grammar led adaptation of the repetitious act I define as renarration. This thesis will explore the extent of this aesthetic overlap, conducting the first full-length comparative study of Beckett and Stein's aesthetics and writings.