Becketts Dantes Intertextuality in the fiction and criticism

This book is the first study in English on the literary relationship between Beckett and Dante. It is an innovative reading of Samuel Beckett and Dante's works and a critical engagement with contemporary theories of intertextuality. The volume interprets Dante in the original Italian (as it appears in Beckett), translating into English all Italian quotations. It benefits from a multilingual approach based on Beckett's published works in English and French, and on manuscripts (which use English, French, German and Italian). The book is aimed at the scholarly communities interested in literatures in English, literary and critical theory, comparative literature and theory, French literature and theory and Italian studies. Its jargon-free style will also attract third-year or advanced undergraduate students, and postgraduate students, as well as those readers interested in the unusual relationship between one of the greatest writers of the twentieth century and the medieval author who stands for the very idea of the Western canon.

Daniela Caselli is Senior Lecturer in Twentieth-Century Literature at the University of Manchester.

Introduction * Dantes in limbo * Detecting Dante in Joyce * Recycling Dante in Proust * Belacqua does not follow ‘the rule of the road’ * There is no real Belacqua in Dream * Dante and Mr Beckett * Sordello is in the shade * Strata and mysteries: Intratextuality in 'More Pricks Than Kicks'Quick deaths * Screechy flatfooted Tuscany peacocks * Fatigue and disgust: Murphy and Watt * Dante is kept out of sight: Murphy and the manuscripts * Addenda and excorporations * Who is the third beside you? Authority in Mercier and Camier * Vague shadowy shapes * No quotes at any price * Déjà vu beyond reach: from the Novellas to the Three Novels * The calmative effects of one’s classics * Odds and ends * Bits and scraps flickering on and off * Staging the Inferno in 'How It Is' * A voice comes to one in the dark * ‘E fango è il mondo’: the 'Inferno' performed * Geometries of passions * The witness and the scribe * ‘In the words of the poet’: 'The Lost Ones' * Ravening eyes * Closed places * The sun and others stars would still be shining * Conclusion: Farewell to the Old Lutist * Bibliography