Beckett’s Queer Atavism

Abstract

Queer readings of Samuel Beckett’s antipathy to reproduction have focused on his refusal of futurity. This essay expands on previous studies of anti-futurity in Beckett’s work by exploring his fascination with atavism, regression, and decadence. Beckett’s anti-vitalist modernism departs from James Joyce’s preoccupation with the fruitful potentialities of the degenerate body; from his early story “Echo’s Bones” to his final full-length novel How It Is, he links atavism to the queer refusal of generative life. By extension, Beckett’s “queer atavism” presents a striking alternative to recent neovitalist affirmations of the inhuman in queer theory and modernist studies.