The article is devoted to the poetic output of Samuel Beckett, particularly from the pre-war period. It primarily offers a close analysis of three poems: The Vulture, Alba and Dortmunder, from the fi rst printed collection of Beckett’s poetry Echo’s Bones. These texts raise the issue of the place of art and poetic creation in the world, fi lled as it is with suffering inherent to the human condition. The valorization of nighttime and music and the pain-relieving aesthetic contemplation form the major premises of Alba and Dortmunder. And The Vulture, an artistic credo of the young Beckett, defi nes the relations between macrocosm, the objective world, and microcosm, the rich inner life of the subject, vis-à-vis the tasks of poetry. Noting the striking neglect of Beckett’s poetry by the critics, the article undertakes to show that his poetic production merits attention both of scholars and of his devoted admirers.
The sample of Polish version of this article is available here: https://tekstualia.pl/pl/numery/beckettwpolsce