Ministry of Higher and Secondary Special Education

THE MINISTRY OF HIGHER AND SECONDARY SPECIAL EDUCATION OF THE REPUBLIC OF UZBEKISTAN

URGENCH STATE UNIVERSITY
FACULTY OF FOREIGN PHILOLOGY


Course work

ON THE ENGLISH AND AMERICAN LITERATURE

THEME: “Murphy by Samuel Beckett”

Supervisor: *************** (senior teacher) of “The English Language and Literature” department

Done by: Sodullayeva Risolat Group 1912 student of the “The Foreign Language and Literature” speciality

Urganch – 2021

The 100 best novels: No 61 – Murphy by Samuel Beckett (1938)

Samuel Beckett’s first published novel is an absurdist masterpiece, a showcase for his uniquely comic voice

Samuel Beckett: ‘one of the giants of 20th-century literature, in any language’. Photograph: Jane Bown/ Guardian News & Media

“The sun shone, having no alternative, on the nothing new.” Samuel Beckett’s entry into this series with his characteristically bleak, nihilistic humour, marks another milestone: the first appearance since Shakespeare of a writer who will innovate as brilliantly in theatre as much as in poetry and prose. Beckett, indeed, is one of the giants of 20th-century literature, in any language.

Murphy is an absurdist masterpiece, a first novel that emerged from a long literary apprenticeship, mainly conducted in post-first world war Paris. It was the first substantial work by a young man – Beckett was born on Good Friday, 13 April, 1906 in Foxrock, just south of Dublin – who had been experimenting for years with poetry and prose, partly influenced by James Joyce, for whom he also worked as an unconventional secretary.

Murphy, which would soon become overshadowed by the international success of Waiting for Godot, is the first in a series of novels whose titles – Molloy; Malone Dies – begin with the 13th letter of the alphabet. Beckett, always nomadic, had returned to London from Dublin in September 1934 and taken lodgings in Gertrude Street, West Brompton. The novel draws extensively on his experience of living in London and the character of Murphy has plenty of Beckett in him.

Advertisement

The workshy eponymous hero, a “seedy solipsist”, adrift in the alienating metropolis, realises that his desires can never be fulfilled conventionally. He withdraws from life in search of a personal stupor. When the novel opens, Murphy has tied himself to the rocking chair in his flat with seven scarves and is rocking to and fro in the darkness. This practice, apparently habitual, has become Murphy’s way of achieving an existential state of being that gives him deep private satisfaction. Even his lover, Celia, cannot lure him back into the world. As Murphy’s comico-philosophical meditation unfolds, we meet his circle of fellow eccentrics, notably Mr Neary, from Cork, who has the ability, through what he calls “Apmonia”, to stop the action of his heart.

Murphy is a showcase for Beckett’s uniquely comic voice, his command of absurdist narrative, and fascination with existential, mind-body issues of being and nothingness. Eventually, after many vicissitudes, Murphy finds refuge in the Magdalen Mental Mercyseat (an asylum). Foreshadowing the title of Beckett’s second play Endgame, the novel ends with a game of chess between Murphy and Mr Endon in which Murphy resigns and then soon after dies, setting fire to himself in his lonely room and reducing himself to dust and oblivion.