Allegories of clarity and obscurity: Bunyan's The Pilgrim's Progress and Beckett's Molloy
Allegories of clarity and obscurity: Bunyan's The Pilgrim's Progress and Beckett's Molloy
This article explores the ways in which Beckett’s Molloy can be considered as an allegory – a modern narrative which both uses and confuses the methods of traditional allegory. John Bunyan, in The Pilgrim’s Progress, was able to depend upon his readers’ knowledge of the bible to decode the allegorical nature of his text. He used the journey narrative, so widespread in oral and written literature through the ages, to tell the tale of Christian and his endeavours to lead a good life and reach his ultimate goal – heaven. Beckett, on the other hand, treats the journey narrative in quite a different way. This discussion is concerned with the way Beckett redefines the allegoric mode, simultaneously encouraging and thwarting the reader’s interpretive activity, and the ways in which the allusions to Bunyan’s text which are present in Molloy play a part in this process
89-103
Campbell, Julie
8651d768-dd71-4b4e-8c19-98f32b53c1d5
November 2012
Campbell, Julie
8651d768-dd71-4b4e-8c19-98f32b53c1d5
Campbell, Julie
(2012)
Allegories of clarity and obscurity: Bunyan's The Pilgrim's Progress and Beckett's Molloy.
Samuel Beckett Today/Aujourd'hui, 24, .
Abstract
This article explores the ways in which Beckett’s Molloy can be considered as an allegory – a modern narrative which both uses and confuses the methods of traditional allegory. John Bunyan, in The Pilgrim’s Progress, was able to depend upon his readers’ knowledge of the bible to decode the allegorical nature of his text. He used the journey narrative, so widespread in oral and written literature through the ages, to tell the tale of Christian and his endeavours to lead a good life and reach his ultimate goal – heaven. Beckett, on the other hand, treats the journey narrative in quite a different way. This discussion is concerned with the way Beckett redefines the allegoric mode, simultaneously encouraging and thwarting the reader’s interpretive activity, and the ways in which the allusions to Bunyan’s text which are present in Molloy play a part in this process
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Published date: November 2012
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Local EPrints ID: 178291
URI: http://eprints.soton.ac.uk/id/eprint/178291
ISSN: 0927-3131
PURE UUID: 214e1383-94aa-43f7-a48b-061c6adef01a
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Date deposited: 24 Mar 2011 09:33
Last modified: 08 Jan 2022 14:35
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Author:
Julie Campbell
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