Resumen de Revealing the Limit of Language in Relation to Music
Beckett’s critique of language in his early period is related to his strong interest in music. He regards music as an idealised model for literature that transcends the limits of language. This essay examines how the relation between language and music is presented in Beckett’s radio plays, Words and Music and Cascando, in terms of his idea of ‘materiality’ and ‘immateriality’. Both plays present words and music as characters in their own right (Joe and Bob in Words and Music, and Voice and Music in Cascando).By juxtaposing language with music, Words and Music discloses the limit of language. The limit of language implies the materiality of language. The play suggests that whereas music can express what Schopenhauer describes as ‘that which of its essence can never be representation’ or the ineffable, language fails to do so. In Cascando, Voice is gradually immaterialised by the help of Music and becomes more and more self-reflexive. In this movement language reveals its own finitude.In both radio plays Beckett reveals the limit of language in its relation to music. He shows the possibility that only by returning to and showing the finitude of language, language can get access to the ineffable.
