Digital Manuscript ProjectKrapp's Last Tape / La Dernière Bande

[0157]
happiness.[0158] Unattainable laxation.[0159] Sneers at what he calls
his youth and thanks to God that it is over.[0161] False ring
there.[0162] (Pause.)[0163] Shadow of the opus...magnum.[0164] VClosing with
a - (brief laugh) - yelp to Providence.[0165] (Prolonged laugh
in which Krapp joins.)[0166] What remains of all that misery?
[0167] A girl in a shabby green coat, on a railway-station plat-
form?[0168] No?
[0169] Pause.
[0170] When I look -[0171] (Krapp
[0171] Krapp switches off, broods, looks at his watch, gets
up, goes backstage into darkness. [0172] Ten seconds. [0173] Pop of
cork. [0174] Ten seconds. [0175] Second cork. [0176] Ten seconds. [0177] Third cork.
[0178] Ten seconds. [0179] Brief burst of wavering song. quavering song.
[0184] - back on the year that is gone, with what I hope is perhaps
a glint of the old eye to come, there is of course the
house on the canal where mother lay a-dying, in the late
autumn, after her long viduity (Krapp gives a start), and
the -[0185] (Krapp switches off, winds back tape a little, bends
his ear closer to machine, switches on)[0186] - a-dying, after
her long viduity, and the -
[0191] (reading from dictionary).[0192] State - or condition - of being -
or remaining - a widow - or widower.[0193] (Looks up. [0194] Puzzled.)
[0195] Being - or remaining?...[0196](Pause. [0197] He peers again at diction-
ary. [0198] Reading.)[0199] "Deep weeds of viduity"...[0200]Also of an animal,
especially a bird...the vidua or weaver-bird...[0201]Black plumage
of male...[0202](He looks up. [0203] With relish.)[0204] The vidua-bird!
[0205] Pause. [0206] He closes dictionary, switches on, resumes listening
posture.
[0207] - bench by the weir from where I could see her window.
[0208] There I sat, in the biting wind, wishing she were gone.[0209] (
(Pause.)[0210] Deserted spot it was, Hardly a soul just a few regulars, nurse-
maids, infants, old men, dogs. I got to know them quite
well - oh by appearance of course I mean!
[0213] And yet when I was bold enough to speak
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Krapp's Last Tape / La Dernière Bande © 2015 Samuel Beckett Digital Manuscript Project.
Editors: Dirk Van Hulle and Vincent Neyt