The Work, The Neutral and The Unnamable

Abstract

The Unnamable is more than difficult, it gives voice to the new. Maurice Blanchot's theory of the work and the neutral provides a significant contribution to Beckett criticism because through these ideas, he responds to Beckett's capacity for invention. Blanchot believes that the work, as a autonomous object, is borne out of difficulty. Beckett's writing is not only exemplary of this, it plays out the suffering and frustration of transforming words into ideas, ideas into stories and stories into memories. Beckett goes further than illustrate philosophical concepts, he dramatises them. The Unnamable gives them voice, breath, sound and silence.