Samuel Beckett
Digital Manuscript Project
L'Innommable / The Unnamable

MS-HRC-SB-5-9-2

MS. Pages: cover - 04r 04v - 09r 09v - 14r 14v - 19r 19v - 24r 24v - 29r 29v - 34r 34v - 39r 39v - 44r 44v - backcover

[p. 19v]
DOODLE 35 DOODLE 36

[1576] [p. 20r] like dust, they want to make a man out of dust. [1577] Do you hear them, xxx losing heart? Listen to them, losing heart! [1578] That's to lull me, so that till I imagine I hear myself saying, myself at last, to myself at last, that it can't be they, speaking thus, that I can only be I, speaking thus. [1579] Ah if I could only find a voice of my own in this clamour choir, it would be the end of their troubles, and of mine. [1581] That's why there all these little silences, to make me break them. [1582] They think I can't bear silence, that my horror of silence will force to break it some day, no matter how. [1583] They That's why they are always breaking off, to try and drive me to extremities. [1584] But they don't dare to be silent too long, the whole fabric might collapse. [1585] It's true I hate these chasms they all bend over, on the alert for a human murmur the murmur of a man. [1586] It isn't silence, it's pitfalls, into which nothing would please me better than to fall, uttering with the little cry that might be taken for human, like a wounded ouistiti, the first and last, and vanish for good good, having squeaked. [1587] Well, if they ever succeed in having me in getting me to impart a voice to Worm, in a moment of euphoria, who knows, perhaps I'll make it mine, in a moment of confusion. [1588] There we have the stake. [1589] But they won't succeed. [1590] xxx xxx Were they able to get Mahood to talk? [1591] It seems to me not. [1592] I think Murphy talked from time to time, the others too perhaps, I don't remember, but it was clumsily done, I could see the ventriloquist. [1593] I feel it's about to begin. [1594] They must consider me sufficiently besotted, with all their balls about being & existing. [1595] Yes, now that I've forgotten who Worm is, what xxx he's like, where he is, I'll begin to be he. [1596] Anything rather than these college quips. [1597] Quick, a place. [1598] Inaccessible, inescapable, With no way in, no way out, a safe place. [1599] Not like Eden. [1600] And Worm inside. [1601] Feeling nothing, knowing nothing, capable of nothing, wanting nothing. [1602] Until the instant he hears this sound that will never stop. [1603] Then it's the end, Worm ceases no longer is. [1604] We know it, but we don't say it, we say it's the awakening, the beginning of Worm, for now we must speak, and speak of Worm. [1605] It's no longer he, xx but let us proceed as if it were still he, whose ear trembles, who hears, xxx and trembles, and is committed to unhappiness, and to the delivered over, to unhappiness, and affliction, and the struggle to withstand it, the anxious eye, the labouring mind xxx [1606] Yes, let us call that thing Worm, so as to exclaim,

[p. 20v]
DOODLE 37 DOODLE 38 DOODLE 39

[1606] [p. 21r] 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. [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 proceed with method. [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. [1616] This tiny 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! [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. [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. [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 which already I may flatter myself on having a foot, there are other noises even more unpleasant, which will make themselves heard before long. [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. [1628] To realize that bah it's nothing. [1629] A joke. That will not last for ever A trifle. [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

[p. 21v]
addition 8→
DOODLE 40
addition 9→

[1638] [p. 22r] have to come and stick into me, as in the case of they stuck them did into their unfortunate Jesus. [1639] No, I need nobody, they'll start sprouting up under xxx my arse, unaided, some day when I feel myself soaring above my condition. [1640] A bowl of th A billy bowl of thorns, and the air sweet smelling. [1641] But not too fast. [1642] I still leave to be desired, I have no technique, none. [1643] For example, in case you don't believe me, I have not yet learned don't yet know how how to move, either locally, in relation to myself, or bodily, in relation to the shit. [1644] I don't know how to want to, I want to in vain. [1645] What doesn't come from me is knocking has come to the wrong address. [1646] Similarly the my understanding is not sufficiently well-oiled to function xxx without the pressure of some critical circumstance, as for example a sudden violent pain felt for the first time. [1647] Some nice point in semantics, for example, of a nature to to accelerate the march of time the hours, could not retain my attention. [1648] For others the [] time-abolishing [] joys of impersonal and disinterested speculation. [1649] I only think, if that is the name for this vertiginous panic as of hornets smoked hornets smoked out of their nest, once a certain degree of terror has been exceeded. [1650] Does this mean that I am less and less exposed to it, by the grace of inurement? [1651] To think so would be to underestimate the extent of the repertory in which I am plunged and which, it appears, is nothing compared to what is waiting for me at the conclusion of my novitiate. [1652] These lights, gleaming low afar, xxx then rearing up, in a blaze and sweeping upon me, blinding, to devour me, x are merely one example. [1653] My familiarity with them avails me nothing, each time they give me to reflect. [1654] Invariably at the last moment up to now Each time up to now at the last moment, just as I am beginning to sizzle, they go out, smoking and hissing, I know, and xxx nevertheless each time I xx my phlegm is shattered. [1655] And in my head, which I am beginning to locate to my satisfaction, above and a little to the right, the sparks spurt and dash themselves out against the walls. [1656] Sometimes I tell say to myself that I too am in my head, it's terror makes me say say it, and the longing to be in safety, surrounded on all sides by massive bone. [1657] And I add that I am foolish to let myself be frightened by another's thoughts, lacerating my sky with inno harmless gleams and besieging me with noises signifying nothing. [1658] But one thing at a time. [1659] And often all sleeps, as when I was really Worm, except this voice

[p. 22v]
DOODLE 41 DOODLE 42

[1659] [p. 23r] which has denatured me, which never stops, but often grows confused and hesitant, as it were going to abandon me. [1660] But it is only a momentary weakness, unless it is done on purpose, to teach me hope. [1661] And it's a strange thing, ruined as I am, in the xxx in the young still young in the abjection they have brought me to, that I should I sometimes seem to remember what I was like when I was Worm, and not yet delivered into their hands. [1662] That's to tempt me to say into saying I am indeed Worm after all, tempted and tempt me to think and into thinking that he may have become what I have become. [1663] But it doesn't come off. [1664] But they'll find another means, less childish, of getting me to admit, or pretend to admit, that I am he whom they name whose name they call me by, and no other. [1665] Or they'll wait, counting on my weariness, as their as they harass me more and more, to xxx make me to forget xxx him who cannot be brought to the pass they have brought me to, not to mention yesterday, and tomorrow. [1666] And yet I seem to remember it seems to me I remember, and shall never forget, what I was like when I was he, before all became confused. [1667] But that is of course impossible, since Worm could not know what he was like, or who he was, that's the way they want me to reason. [1668] And it seems to me too, which is even more deplorable, that I could become Worm again, if only I was left in peace. [1669] This transmission is really excellent. [1670] I wonder if it's going to get us somewhere. [1671] If only they would stop talking for nothing, pending their stopping everything. [1672] Nothing? [1673] That's an easy thing to say. [1674] It is not for me to judge. [1675] With What would I judge with?? [1676] It's more provocation. [1677] They want me to lose patience , and rush, to their suddenly beside myself, to their rescue. [1678] How transparent that all is! [1679] Sometimes I say to myself, they say to me, Worm says to me, the person subject matters little, that my purveyors are more than one, four or five. [1680] And yet there is no harmony, no common ground. [1681] It's more likely the same foul individual all the time, amusing himself pretending to be many a many, with changes of register, tone, accent and rot. [1682] Unless he is by nature thus. [1683] A bare and rusty hook I might accept. [1684] But all these titbits. [1685] But there are long silences too, at long intervals, during which, hearing nothing, I say nothing. [1686] That is to say I hear a murmuring going on, if I listen hard enough. [1687] But it's not for me, it's for them alone, they are putting

[p. 23v]
DOODLE 43 DOODLE 44 DOODLE 45
Reprise 21.1.58 après échec de Henry et Ada DOODLE 46

[1725] Trou de Botal?
DOODLE 47

[1687] [p. 24r] their heads together again. [1688] I don't hear what they say, I only know that they are still there, that they haven't finished, with me. [1689] They have moved a little aside. [1690] Secrets. [1691] Or if there's only one it's he alone, taking counsel with himself, muttering and chewing his moustache, xxxing ready getting ready for a new deluge of inanities. working himself up for a fresh flow of inanities. [1692] To think xxx xxx of me eavesdropping, me, as soon as silence falls! [1693] Ah a nice state they have me in. [1694] But it's with the hope there's no one left. [1695] But this is not the time to speak of that. [1696] Good. [1697] Of what is this the time to speak? [1698] Of Worm, at last. [1699] Good. [1700] We must first, to begin with, go back to his beginnings, and then, in order to continue, follow him patiently through his the various stages, taking care to show their fatal concatenation, which have made him what I am. DOODLE 48 [1701] The whole xxx to be xxx xxx To be tossed off with the maximum of bravura. [1702] Then notes from day to day, until I capitulate. [1703] And to finish wind up with song and dance of thanksgiving by victim, to celebrate xxx his nativity. [1704] Please God nothing goes wrong. [1705] Mahood I couldn't die. [1706] Worm will I ever get born? [1707] It's the same problem. [1708] But perhaps not the same personage after all. [1709] Time will tell, it's not particular. [1710] But let us go back as planned, afterwards we'll collapse fall forward as projected. [1711] The contrary would be more like the truth. nearer the truth. This sounds upside down. It is the reverse I should say. [1712] The important thing is to say something. [1713] Upstream, downstream, no matter, I begin by the ear, that's the way to talk. [1714] Before that it's the night of time. [1715] Whereas Whereas since, what light! [1716] Now I know where I am, as far as my origins are concerned, I mean my origins considered as a subject of conversation, that is all that counts. [1717] The moment one can say, Someone is on his way, all is well. [1718] Perhaps I have still a thousand years to go. [1719] That do No matter. [1720] He is on his way. [1721] I begin to know the premises. [1722] I wonder if I couldn't slip sneak out by the fundament, one morning, with the breakfast. [1723] No, I can't stir, not yet. [1724] xxx xxx One day in a head and the next in a belly, strange, and the next nowhere in particular. [1725] Perhaps it's Botal's Hole (?) when all about me palpitates and labours. [1726] Bait, bait. [1727] Can it be I have a friend, among them, shaking his head in sorrow and saying nothing or only, from time to time, Let it be Enough, enough. [1728] One can be before beginning, they have set their hearts on that. [1729] They want me roots and all. [1730] This onward rushing time is the same which used to sleep. [1731] And this silence they clamour against in vain and which one day will fall again one day will reign again, the same as in the past. [1732] Perhaps a little the

MS. Pages: cover - 04r 04v - 09r 09v - 14r 14v - 19r 19v - 24r 24v - 29r 29v - 34r 34v - 39r 39v - 44r 44v - backcover