Samuel Beckett
Digital Manuscript Project
L'Innommable / The Unnamable

MS-HRC-SB-5-9-2

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Segment 1

[1606] the sleight of hand accomplished, Look Look,
life again, life everywhere and always,
the life that is on every tongue, the only possible!
[1607] Poor Worm, who thought he was different,
there he is in the madhouse for life.
[1608] Where
am I?
[1609] That is my first question, after a
life of listening.

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Segment 2

[1610] From this question,
when it hasn't been answered, I'll rebound
towards others, of a more personal nature,
much later.
[1611] Perhaps I'll end up, before
returning to my coma, by thinking of myself
as living, technically speaking.
[1612] But let us
proceed by order xxx xxx But let us pro-
ceed with method.

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Segment 3

[1613] I shall do my best, as
always, since I cannot do otherwise.
[1614] I shall
submit, more corpse-obliging than ever.
[1615] I shall transmit the words as received, by
the ear, or roared into the anus, through a
trumpet, in all their purity, and in the same
order, as far as possible.

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Segment 4

[1616] This tiny [place = supralinear] infinitesimal hesitation,
between the arrival and the departure, this minute
delay in the matter of evacuation, is all I have
to worry about.
[1617] The truth about me will boil forth
at last, provided they start stuttering again.
[1618] I listen.[1619] Enough procrastination!

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Segment 5

[1620] I am
Worm, that is to say I am no longer he,
since suddenly I hear.
[1621] But I'll forget that,
in the heat of misery, I'll forget I am no
longer Worm, but a kind of tenth rate
Toussaint Louverture, that's what they
counting on.

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Segment 6

[1622] Worm then I catch this sound which
will never stop, monotone b monotonous
beyond words, and yet at the same time not
devoid of a certain variety.

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Segment 7

[1623] At the end of
I know not what eternity, I don't they
don't say, this has sufficiently exasperated
my intelligence for it to grasp that here we
have a voice and that, in the natural world in
where [place = supralinear] which already I may flatter myself on having
a foot, there are other noises even more un-
pleasant, which will make themselves heard
before long.

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Segment 8

[1624] xxx Don't tell me after that
that I had no predispositions for the common lot.
[1625] What a weary road since that first misfortune!
[1626] What nerves torn alive from the heart of insentience,
with the appertaining fears, and the cerebellum
on fire.
[1627] xx it was It took him a long time
to adapt himself to this excoriation.

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Segment 9

[1628] To
realize that bah it's nothing.
[1629] A joke.
That will not last for ever A trifle.

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Segment 10

[1630] The common lot common lot.[1631] A joke.
[1632] That will not last for ever.[1633] To be enjoyed while
it lasts.
[1634] They mentioned roses to me.[1635] I'll end
up by smelling them, that's the way it goes.
[1636] Then they'll put the accent on the thorns.
[1637] What prodigious variety.[1638] Thorns, these they'll

Transcription
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