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Untitled
A three legged chair and a garbage can full of snow recently staged a play in an empty parking space. Most residents of the neighborhood saw the gathering as a mere claiming of a snow shoveled space. Unfortunate, since the performance may have been one play of an unfinished, presumed lost Samuel Beckett trilogy.
Though no script of the play is known to exist, the idea for the work is mentioned in letters, predates Waiting for Godot, and has long been the subject of debate among theater historians. Local anthropomorphologists have inspected the can and link it stylistically to props from Beckett’s play Endgame. It’s also similar in construction to garbage bins manufactured in Paris during his time there. Research into the chair's origins has been inconclusive.
A tenant whose apartment overlooks the parking area recalls odd activity. While washing his windows, he noticed the chair teetering in the wind. A man pushing a grocery cart stopped abruptly beside the space. He watched for five minutes, possibly the length of the performance. During a long pause which may have signaled the end of the play, he suddenly rushed toward the two parallel yellow lines. Just as he was about to enter the space, a pedestrian turned the corner. The man hesitated, then returned to his cart and continued down the drive.
The day after the performance, the chair was missing and likely stolen. The snow had melted and the garbage can was on the curb, now half filled with garbage. When Eric Bartlett returned to his shoveled space, the sight of the missing chair sent him into a rage about thievery, neighborliness, parking, and global injustice. He lifted the can to return it to the space, and so reassert his rightful ownership. As he did, he slipped on a patch of ice, tumbled onto the asphalt, and rolled with the can into the center of the parking space. The same spot the chair and garbage can had occupied the day before. From the belly of the courtyard came a disembodied voice, “Squatter’s rights.” Laughter from an apartment window merely rekindled his outrage. Bartlett resumed his rant from the ground. It was this scene that first triggered the connections to Beckett’s play.
Early in his career, Beckett saw a neighbor’s possessions hauled out of his building and left the sidewalk. Given that he was on the verge of eviction himself, this incident and a line from a letter has led to much conjecture: “Such a fine space for parking.” It could reveal concerns about his own living situation. Not owning a car at the time, it’s unlikely the comment was automotive in nature.
The line composes its own paragraph. It rests uneasily between a long paragraph about the frustrations of publishing and an exceedingly longer one about a rashers and bangers breakfast where the bangers were knocked on the floor. Given its free floating context, the line lends itself to wide interpretations. It may be a non sequitor or, as one armchair psychologist suggested, “an artistic land grab.” Since Beckett’s precarious finances kept him a renter and pedestrian, “through the work, he was claiming a small piece of land as his own.”
Draw your own conclusions. Join the debates at the counter of the Parking Bureau. But walk distractedly through neighborhoods at the risk of missed cultural opportunities. Rumor has it that a spare tire, a blown out carburetor, and an Eldorado chassis are staging a hip-hopped up Camus play. Possibly in a west side abandoned car park.
If these performances prove true, Beckett may have posthumously spawned a theatrical movement. If it takes hold, he will have stripped the play of not just words, but actors, and a theater as well. Set the space and life will circulate. Artistic viability may just be a matter of raiding your living room and garage of its clutter.
Already anticipating the legislatablity of such a trend, the city council is considering a special session. The topic would be the zoning legitimacy and taxability of “performance based parking space occupancy.” One alderman claims his candor on the proposal --- “What a friggin’ waste of time.” --- has lost his district funding.
Word of the Beckett staging, or spacing, has spread quickly. When asked if he’d heard of the performance, a desk clerk at the auto pound observed, “All the city’s a parking space, all the furniture and garbage receptacles merely players.”
Asked about the prospect of a new Beckett play, a man outside a Parisian resale shop put his Age of Reason on the curb, thought for a moment, and in a cloud of cigarette smoke said, “What furniture has wrought, no man can undo.”
In a Dublin pub, a man sat reading a newspaper. At the mention of the topic, he shook his head, “This again.” He then transferred a fish from the bar to his newspaper, tucked it under his arm, and left behind a two-word summation,
“Fuckin’ Tossers.”
Untitled
A three legged chair and a garbage can full of snow recently staged a play in an empty parking space. Most residents of the neighborhood saw the gathering as a mere claiming of a snow shoveled space. Unfortunate, since the performance may have been one play of an unfinished, presumed lost Samuel Beckett trilogy.
Though no script of the play is known to exist, the idea for the work is mentioned in letters, predates Waiting for Godot, and has long been the subject of debate among theater historians. Local anthropomorphologists have inspected the can and link it stylistically to props from Beckett’s play Endgame. It’s also similar in construction to garbage bins manufactured in Paris during his time there. Research into the chair's origins has been inconclusive.
A tenant whose apartment overlooks the parking area recalls odd activity. While washing his windows, he noticed the chair teetering in the wind. A man pushing a grocery cart stopped abruptly beside the space. He watched for five minutes, possibly the length of the performance. During a long pause which may have signaled the end of the play, he suddenly rushed toward the two parallel yellow lines. Just as he was about to enter the space, a pedestrian turned the corner. The man hesitated, then returned to his cart and continued down the drive.
The day after the performance, the chair was missing and likely stolen. The snow had melted and the garbage can was on the curb, now half filled with garbage. When Eric Bartlett returned to his shoveled space, the sight of the missing chair sent him into a rage about thievery, neighborliness, parking, and global injustice. He lifted the can to return it to the space, and so reassert his rightful ownership. As he did, he slipped on a patch of ice, tumbled onto the asphalt, and rolled with the can into the center of the parking space. The same spot the chair and garbage can had occupied the day before. From the belly of the courtyard came a disembodied voice, “Squatter’s rights.” Laughter from an apartment window merely rekindled his outrage. Bartlett resumed his rant from the ground. It was this scene that first triggered the connections to Beckett’s play.
Early in his career, Beckett saw a neighbor’s possessions hauled out of his building and left the sidewalk. Given that he was on the verge of eviction himself, this incident and a line from a letter has led to much conjecture: “Such a fine space for parking.” It could reveal concerns about his own living situation. Not owning a car at the time, it’s unlikely the comment was automotive in nature.
The line composes its own paragraph. It rests uneasily between a long paragraph about the frustrations of publishing and an exceedingly longer one about a rashers and bangers breakfast where the bangers were knocked on the floor. Given its free floating context, the line lends itself to wide interpretations. It may be a non sequitor or, as one armchair psychologist suggested, “an artistic land grab.” Since Beckett’s precarious finances kept him a renter and pedestrian, “through the work, he was claiming a small piece of land as his own.”
Draw your own conclusions. Join the debates at the counter of the Parking Bureau. But walk distractedly through neighborhoods at the risk of missed cultural opportunities. Rumor has it that a spare tire, a blown out carburetor, and an Eldorado chassis are staging a hip-hopped up Camus play. Possibly in a west side abandoned car park.
If these performances prove true, Beckett may have posthumously spawned a theatrical movement. If it takes hold, he will have stripped the play of not just words, but actors, and a theater as well. Set the space and life will circulate. Artistic viability may just be a matter of raiding your living room and garage of its clutter.
Already anticipating the legislatablity of such a trend, the city council is considering a special session. The topic would be the zoning legitimacy and taxability of “performance based parking space occupancy.” One alderman claims his candor on the proposal --- “What a friggin’ waste of time.” --- has lost his district funding.
Word of the Beckett staging, or spacing, has spread quickly. When asked if he’d heard of the performance, a desk clerk at the auto pound observed, “All the city’s a parking space, all the furniture and garbage receptacles merely players.”
Asked about the prospect of a new Beckett play, a man outside a Parisian resale shop put his Age of Reason on the curb, thought for a moment, and in a cloud of cigarette smoke said, “What furniture has wrought, no man can undo.”
In a Dublin pub, a man sat reading a newspaper. At the mention of the topic, he shook his head, “This again.” He then transferred a fish from the bar to his newspaper, tucked it under his arm, and left behind a two-word summation,
“Fuckin’ Tossers.”