--logue

(We see Sam Ferree and Samuel Beckett standing, slightly toward audience, in thought.  Ferree is perplexed.  A dark, grey stage.  No windows.  No doors.  The hint that they are contained; not outside.  There is a wooden table, rectangular, and two squeaky chairs.  A pitch black velveteen box sits on the table.  Two glasses, an empty glass pitcher.  An unlit melted candle.)

                                                            FERREE

What?

                                                            BECKETT

I don't believe I said anything.

                                                            FERREE        

Oh.  I thought you did.

                                                            BECKETT

You thought?

                                                            FERREE

Yes.

(Pause.)

                                                            FERREE

Sam Ferree.

                                                            BECKETT

Sam Beckett.

(They shake left hands, realize their mistake and shake right hands.)

                                                            FERREE

You can call me Sam.

                                                            BECKETT

Alright, Sam.  You can call me Sam.

(A pause.  They contemplate.  Ferree laughs and quickly stops when he sees Beckett's grave                                                                             expression.)

                                                           

                                                            FERREE

Sorry.

                                                            BECKETT
I forgive you.

(Pause.)

                                                            FERREE

Do you want a cigarette?

                                                            BECKETT

Yes.  I would like one.

                                                            FERREE

I'm out.  I smoked the last one a few minutes ago.

                                                            BECKETT

Smoked the last of what?

                                                            FERREE

A few minutes ago.

                                                            BECKETT

Were they good?

                                                            FERREE

There was just the one.  But yes, it was good.  It reminded me of the first time I smoked.

                                                            BECKETT
When was that?

                                                            FERREE

I don't remember.  But I was heart broken.

                                                            BECKETT

Oh.

(Beckett removes rolling paper and filters from his jacket.  He does this as if discovering them while                                                                   digging through his pockets for change, but is not surprised to find them instead.)

                                                            BECKETT

All we need is tobacco.

                                                            FERREE

That's progress.

                                                            BECKETT

What's in the box?

                                                            FERREE

A Macguffin.

                                                            BECKETT

I want it.

                                                            FERREE

So do I.

(They walk over to the box..)

                                                            FERREE

I'm afraid.

                                                            BECKETT

Don't worry.  I'm here by your side.

                                                            FERREE

But what if it's empty?

(Beckett opens the box, withdraws a plastic baggy of tobacco.)

                                                            FERREE

That's a relief.

           

                                                            BECKETT

I was afraid too.

                                                            FERREE

You were very brave.

                                                            BECKETT

Thank you.

(Beckett sits down.  The chair squeaks.  He starts to role the tobacco, carefully, precisely.  Ferree                                                                         watches with growing amazement.)

                                                            FERREE

I just read your play.  Endgame.  I don't think I really got it.  (Pause.)  That's the perfect amount of tobacco.  (Pause.)  They say you write it in French to dumb down the language.  To get to the bones of the apocalypse.  (Pause.)  I can never roll that well.  (Pause.)  Where was I?  Oh, the end of the world, right.  I think about the world ending a lot - what I'd do.  There wouldn't be much, would there?

(Beckett hands Ferree one of the rolled cigarettes.)

                                                            FERREE

My god, man!  What an immaculate cigarette!

(Ferree produced a lighter from his pocket and lights both cigarettes.  He pauses and stares at the laughter.  He laughs heartily.  Beckett chuckles.)

                                                            FERREE

It's good to laugh.

(Pause.  Beckett speaks as if they have been talking about happiness the whole time.)

                                                            BECKETT

Are you happy?

                                                            FERREE

I am now.

                                                            BECKETT

And before?

                                                            FERREE

I don't remember.

(Pause.  Beckett slowly makes a circle in the air with his cigarette.)

                                                            BECKETT
What?

                                                            FERREE

What?

                                                            BECKETT

Oh.  Nothing.

End

STRINDBERG!!!!

I really wish I could've met August Strindberg.  Not that I particularly like his work or find the man especially likeable.  Honestly, I wish we could've met and he would immediately be seized by uncontrollable, inexplicable loathing so that he would spend the rest of his days trying to foil my every action.  Yes, I want August Strindberg to be my arch enemy so that, at an appropriately climatic moment in my life, I can scream, "STRINDBERG!!!!"  into the raging wind and collapsing inferno of my life.

However, I'm glad that I never met Samuel Beckett.  It would've sucked being friends with him.  Can you imagine planning to meet Beckett for a drink or inviting him over for dinner?  Every time he was late you'd think to yourself, "Christ, I'm waiting for Beckett again."  The irony would just be too much.

#

Happy St. Patrick's Day! I will now meander my way to St. Charles Avenue where I drunken Irish float riders will throw cabbages and potatoes at me. This should be interesting. There will be stew!

Heroes

Today I finished reading Seamus Heaney's translation of Beowulf. Maybe my expectations were too High, but I was hoping that by reading this text I would be seized with some sort of poetic, ancestral blood lust. Yes! Now, I will write epics that will survive centuries! Gold! Monsters! Mead!

No such luck.

I was glad for the change of pace, though. I had just finished reading Plato's Republic. Guilt has dictated my reading list over the past few months. You see, I managed to get a BA in English without having read any of the Seminal Texts. Sure, I've read some Shakespeare, but I never got through the whole Bible or Canterbury Tales and I've only read excerpts of The Iliad and The Odyssey. I have read the Epic of Gilgamesh, though.

I know all of these stories by reputation. Because of this I have very high expectations, tracing this lineage of Inspiration back a few thousand years.


The Repbulic was boring.

Beowulf, on the other hand, was like reading a comic book. Seriously. It's a heroic story with vengeance, drinking, fighting, dragons, terrible monsters, episodic ordeals. Who wouldn't want to read this?

Maybe I'm jaded, or perhaps I've read too many deconstructive texts, but all I could think about while reading Beowulf was Alan Moore's The Watchmen. A critic wrote about that epic something to the effect of, "The Watchmen is Alan Moore's admonishment to anyone who ever wanted a hero to save them." And isn't this a fitting parallel? Beowulf ends foreshadowing of the complete destruction of Goetaland from invaders. Because Beowulf won't be there to Save them.

Two days ago my friends and I were sitting around drinking whiskey and talking about Andy Warhol. Yes, we do that sometimes. We tried to discuss his art and his commentaries, but again and again we came back to talking about the man himself. We concluded that he was an asshole and one M pointed out that he was probably sitting up in some ostentatiously flamboyant afterlife laughing at us.

Warhol. Andy Warhol. No matter how you feel about the man, you cannot escape him. Can you? His work is Everywhere. I have no idea what he did to the discussion about Art (and Visual Art in particular), but he certainly did Something Permanent to it.

Kind of like Samuel Beckett.

A few years ago I took a digital poetics class from Dee Morris. In discussing the lineage of digital poetics, she said, "And this all comes back to the great Samuel Beckett." Dee never prefaced any other person with "the great" and it carried the same weight as the Old Man speaking of "the great DiMaggio."

I don't like Beckett. But I can't stop reading him. This goes beyond my desire to familiarize myself with the Canon (just so that I can say, "Yes, I know goddamn canon."). Samuel Beckett Haunts me. Even if his work confuses, frustrates, and bores the hell out of me, I keep coming back to it. Isn't that the best relationship to have with the Greats? To loath and to worship.

My hero, Samuel Beckett. And, in that critic's estimation, he's the best hero I could choose, because I have no wish or expectation for Samuel Beckett to come and save me (though, wouldn't that be awesome?).

If I'm ever reincarnated, I wish I could come back as Samuel Beckett's fingertips.