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- A COMPARATIVE READING OF SAMUEL BECKETT’S ENDGAME AND T. S. ELIOT’S “THEWASTE LAND” IN THE LIGHT OF ...
A COMPARATIVE READING OF SAMUEL BECKETT’S ENDGAME AND T. S. ELIOT’S “THEWASTE LAND” IN THE LIGHT OF ECOCRITICISM*
Authors : Seher Özsert
Pages : 30-49
View : 69 | Download : 50
Publication Date : 2024-04-22
Article Type : Research
Abstract :This study investigates how Samuel Beckett’s absurd drama Endgame (1957) and T. S. Eliot’s poem “The Waste Land” (1922) present a chaotic and pessimistic world through their apocalyptic setting and allusions. The paper juxtaposes the two texts composed in the aftermath of a world war that consistently use an analogous ecocritical perception. Both works reflect the despair and miseries caused by the destruction of nature. Beckett depicts a prominent world of extermination for everything that was once alive. The whole ecosystem has been consummated, and the characters mourn for their present-day sufferings while reminiscing about the past’s splendid times. Through his play, Beckett portrays the inevitable reality that humans bring their own destruction and suffer from the devastating consequences of the life cycle they have damaged. Beckett’s drama mirrors Eliot’s poem “The Waste Land” due to the ominous setting, the desperate characters, and the pessimistic vision for the future of humanity. The hopelessness of the main character, Hamm, in Endgame, is an allusion to the myth of the Fisher King, whose infertility leaves no promise for the resurrection of the land and the preservation of human existence, as similarly depicted in “The Waste Land”. From an ecocritical perspective, the paper analyzes how Beckett’s play and Eliot’s poem reflect the suffering of humanity in the horrid nihility of natural reproduction and the impossibility of finding any cure for this suffering on Earth. The study concludes that Beckett’s play Endgame and Eliot’s poem “The Waste Land” portray human nature denying responsibility till the last moment of the apocalypse, and the ecocritical analysis of the texts reveals that they serve as cautionary narratives with this pessimistic vision by alerting humanity about the environmental destruction of the natural world.Keywords : Endgame, Beckett, The Waste Land, Eliot, Kıyamet, Çevresel Yıkım