Texts for Nothing - SIGNED

London: Calder and Boyars. 1974. Softcover edition of Texts for Nothing (Signature 21), first thus, signed and inscribed on the title page in black ink by the important Irish novelist and playwright, to the actor Alan Wade "with every good wish / Sam Beckett / Paris March 1976." 8vo. 64 pp. Creases to lower corners, light toning around the edges, overall fine. 

Originally published in 1955 in Stories and Texts for Nothing, which gathered three of Beckett's short stories with these thirteen short prose pieces he named "Texts for Nothing"(1950–1952). None of the thirteen "Texts for Nothing" were given titles; they present a variety of voices thrust into the unknown. According to S. E. Gontarski: "What one is left with after the Texts for Nothing is 'nothing,' incorporeal consciousness perhaps, into which Beckett plunged afresh in English in the early 1950s to produce a tale rich in imagery but short on external coherence." Thus these texts, when compared to the three earlier stories, as well as First Love, may be interpreted as representing a movement in Beckett's writing from modernism to postmodernism. Unlike the earlier stories, these pieces are no longer completed stories but shards - "aperçus of a continuous unfolding narrative, glimpses at a never to be complete being (Narrative)." This idea is voiced in text 4, where the narrator admits stories are not required any more: "There's my life, why not, it is one, if you like, if you must, I don't say no, this evening. There has to be one, it seems, once there is speech, no need of a story, a story is not compulsory, just a life, that's the mistake I made, one of the mistakes, to have wanted a story for myself, whereas life alone is enough."

Alan Wade, actor and director, performed the role of Beckett in the 2022 Washington Stage Guild's production of Gino Dilorio's play "Sam and Dede." (21668)

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