Samuel Beckett
Digital Manuscript Project
L'Innommable / The Unnamable

MS-HRC-SB-5-9-3

MS. Pages: cover - 04r 04v - 09r 09v - 14r 14v - 19r 19v - 24r 24v - 29r 29v - 34r 34v - 39r 39v - 44r 44v - 49r 49v - 54r 54v - backcover

[p. 44v]
DOODLE 82 DOODLE 83 DOODLE 84

[p. 45r] of it, I knew it would come, I emerge from it to speak of it, I am in it while I speak of it, if it's I who speak, and it is not, I act as if it were, often I act as if it were I, but at length, was I ever there at length, a long stay, I understand nothing about duration, I can't speak of it, I speak of it all right, I say never and always, I speak of the seasons and the different parts of the day and of the night, the night has no parts, that's because you are asleep, the seasons must resemble one another, perhaps it's springtime now, that's all words they taught me, without making their meaning clear to me, that's how I learnt how to reason, I use them all, all the words they showed me, they were on lists there were lists of them, ah what a strange glow all of a sudden, they were on lists, with images opposite, I must have forgotten some, I must have mixed them up, these nameless images I have, these imageless names, these windows that I would perhaps be better advised to call doors, at least by some other name, and this word man which is perhaps not the right one for the thing I see when I hear it, [2326.2] but an instant, an hour, and so on, how can they be represented, a life, how could they make that clear to me, here, in the dark, I call that the dark, perhaps it's blue azure, they are blank words, but I use them, they come, all those they showed me, all those I remember, I need them all, to be able to go on, it's a lie, twenty would do, trusty trusty and unforgettable and nice nicely varied tried and trusty, unforgettable, nicely varied, that would be palette enough, I'd mix them, I'd vary them, that would be gamut enough, all the things I'd do, if I could, if I wished, and if I could wish, and so I will, I feel it coming, that's how it will end, with heart

[p. 45v]
DOODLE 85 DOODLE 86 DOODLE 87

[p. 46r] rending cries, inarticulate murmurs, to be invented, as I go along, improvised, as I groan along, I'll laugh, that's how it will end, with chuckling, chuck chuck, ow, ha, pah, I'll practise, nyum, hoo, plop, psss pss, nothing but emotion, bing, bang, that's blows, ow, ay, what else, ooh, aah, that's love, enough, it's tiring, hee hee, that's the ribs, of Democritus, no, the other, in the end, it's the end, the ending end, it's the silence, a few gurgles on the silence, the true real x silence, not the one where I macerate, up to the mouth, up to the ear, which covers, uncovers me, breathes with me, like a cat with a mouse, that of the drowned, [2326.3] I've drowned, more than once, it wasn't it, I've I, I've choked myself, set fire to me, beaten on my head with wood and iron, it wasn't I, there was no head, no iron, I didn't do anything to myself, I didn't do anything to anybody, anyone, no one did anything to me, there is no one, there is no wood, I've looked, there is only I, no, not I either, I've looked everywhere, there must be someone, this voice must belong to someone, I have no objection, I I'm quite xxx, what it wills I will, I am that's all right with me, what it wants I want, I am it, I've said so, it says so, from time to time it says so, then it says not, that's all right with me, I want it to go silent, it wants to go silent, it can't, it does for a second, then it starts again, that's not true the real silence, it says that's not the real silence, what's to be said what can be said of the real silence, I don't know, that I don't know what it is, that there's no such thing, that perhaps there is such a thing, yes, that perhaps there is, somewhere, I'll never know. [2327] But when it falters and when it stops, but it falters all every instant, it stops all every instant, yes, but when it stops for a good few moments, a good few moments, what are a good few moments, there are murmurs murmurs,

[p. 46v]
addition 27→
DOODLE 88 DOODLE 89
addition 28→

[2327] [p. 47r] there must be murmurs, and listening, someone listening, no need of an ear, no need of a mouth, the voice listens, as when it speaks, listens to its silence, that makes a murmur, that makes a voice, a small voice, the same voice only small, it sticks in the throat, there's the throat again, there's the mouth again, it fills the ear, then I vomit, someone vomits, someone begins to vomit again, that must be how it happens, I have no explanations to offer, xx to nor to demand, the comma will come where I'll drown for good and all, then the silence, I believe in it this evening, still this evening, how it lasts, that's all right with me, perhaps it's springtime, violets, no, that's autumn, there's a time for everything, for the things that pass, the things that end, they couldn't explain it to me they could never get make me understand that, [], the things that stir, depart, return, a light changing, they could never get me to see that, and death into the bargain, a voice dying, that's a good one, silence at last, not a murmur, xx no air, no one listening, not for the likes of me, xxx amen, on we go. [2328.1] Enormous prison, like a hundred thousand cathedrals, never anything else any more, from this time forth, and in it, somewhere, perhaps, riveted, minute, the prisoner, how can he be found, how false this space is, what false falseness instantly, to want to xxx draw that round you, pu introduce a being put a being there, a cell would be enough, if I gave up, if I could give up, before I began, beginning, before beginning again, what breathlessness, that's right, ejaculations, that helps you go, that puts off the fatal day, no, it's the other way round, I don't know, xxx start again, in this immensity, in this obscurity, go t xxx xxx the go through the motions of starting again, you who cannot stir, you who never started, you the who, go through the movements, what movements, you can't stir, you launch your voice, it loses itself it dies away in the vault it calls that a vault, perhaps it's the firmament, perhaps it's the abyss, those are words, it speaks of a prison, that's all right with me, vast enough for a whole whole people, or for for me alone,

[p. 47v]

[p. 48r] or waiting for me, I'll go there now, I'll try and go there now, I can't stir, I'm there already, I must be there already, perhaps I'm not alone, perhaps a whole people is there, and this voice its, reaching me fitfully, we would have lived, been free a moment, [2328.2] now we talk about it, each one to himself, each one out loud for himself, and we listen, a whole people, talking and listening, at the s simultaneously, that would ex, no, I'm alone, perhaps the first, or perhaps the last, s talking alone, listening alone, alone alone, the others are gone, they are as gone, they are have been stilled, stilled from talking, stilled their voices are stilled, their listening is stilled, one by one after another, at each new-coming, another will come, I won't be the last, I'll be with the others, I'll be as gone, in the silence, it won't be I, it isn't I, I'm not there yet, I'll go there now, I'll try and go there now, not no sense in trying, I wait for await my turn, my turn to go there, my turn to talk there, my turn to listen there, my turn to await there for my turn to go, to be as gone, it takes time, it will it's a long time, it will be a long time, gone where, where do you go from there, you must go elsewhere, and wait elsewhere, for your turn to go again, and so on, so on, a whole people, or I alone, no need of another people, so on, I alone, and come back, and begin again, now, go on, [2328.3] it's a circuit, a long long circuit, I know it well, I must know it well, it's a lie, I can't stir, I haven't stirred, I launch the voice, I hear a voice, there is nowhere but here, there are not two places, there are not two prisons, it's my parlour, it's a parlour, there I wait where I wait for nothing, I don't know where it is, I don't know what it's like, I haven't to bother about that's no business of mine, I don't know if it's big, or if it's small, or if it's closed, or if it's open, [2328.4] that's right, reiterate, that helps you on, open on what, there is nothing else, only it, open on the void, open on the nothing, that's all right with me, those are

[p. 48v]
DOODLE 90

[2328] [p. 49r] words, open on the silence, looking out on the silence, straight out, why not, all this time, on the brink of silence, I knew it, on a rock, lashed to a rock, in the midst of silence, it's great swell rears towards me, I'm streaming with it, it's an x image, those are words, it's a body, it's not I, I'm not I knew it wouldn't be I, I'm not outside, I'm inside, in something, I'm shut up, the silence is outside, outside, inside, there is no place nothing but here, and the silence outside, nothing but this voice, and the silence all round, no need of walls, yes, we must have walls, I must have them, good and thick, I need walls, good and thick, I need a prison, I was right, for me all alone, I'll go there now, I'll put me in it, I'm there already, I'll start looking for me now, I'm there somewhere, it won't be I, that doesn't matter, I'll say it's I, perhaps it will be I, perhaps that's what they are waiting for, there they are again, to give me quittance, waiting for me to say I am someone, to say I am somewhere, to put me out, in the silence. [2329.1] I can't see I see nothing, it's because there is nothing, or it's because I have no eyes, or both, that makes three possibilities, to choose from, but do I really see nothing, it's not the moment to tell a lie, but how can you not lie, what an idea, a voice like this, who can check it, it tries everything, it is blind, it seeks me, in the dark, it seeks a mouth, to put itself in creep into, who can query it, there is no other, you'd need a head, you'd need things, I don't know, I seem too much to know, [2329.2] it's the voice that does that, it goes know all knowing, to make me think I know, to make me think it's mine, eyes don't interest it, it says I have none, or that they are no use to me, then it speaks of tears, then it speaks of gleams, it is truly at a loss, gleams, yes, afar, or near, distances, you know, measures, the less said the better, gleams, as at dawn, and then fading, as at evening, or flaring up, that happens so they do that sometimes, flame up as dazzling as snow, for a second,

MS. Pages: cover - 04r 04v - 09r 09v - 14r 14v - 19r 19v - 24r 24v - 29r 29v - 34r 34v - 39r 39v - 44r 44v - 49r 49v - 54r 54v - backcover