Krapps Last Tape

Krapps Last Tape is a one-act play, in English, by Samuel where 10 years later, on 5 October 1969, Samuel Beckett
Beckett. With a cast of one man, it was written for North- himself staged his text in a most successful performance
ern Irish actor Patrick Magee and rst titled Magee (with Martin Held as Krapp).
monologue". It was inspired by Becketts experience of The rst American performance, on 14 January 1960,
listening to Magee reading extracts from Molloy and From was directed by Alan Schneider and starred Donald
an Abandoned Work on the BBC Third Programme in Davis.
December 1957.[1]
The play was rst performed as a curtain raiser to
Endgame (from 28 October to 29 November 1958) at 2 Synopsis
the Royal Court Theatre, London, directed by Donald
McWhinnie and starring Patrick Magee. It ran for 38 The curtain rises on "[a] late evening in the future.[6]
performances. It is Krapps 69th birthday and he hauls out his old tape
Krapps Last Tape premiered in North America at the recorder, reviews one of the earlier years the recording
Provincetown Playhouse, with the lead role played by he made when he was 39 and makes a new recording
Canadian actor Donald Davis, who won an Obie Award commenting on the last 12 months.
in 1960 for his performance in the play.[2] Krapp is sitting in his den, lit by the white light
above his desk. Black-and-white imagery continues
throughout.[7][8]
1 History On his desk are a tape-recorder and a number of tins con-
taining reels of recorded tape. He consults a ledger. The
tape he is looking to review is the fth tape in Box 3. He
1.1 First publication
reads aloud from the ledger but it is obvious that words
alone are not jogging his memory. He takes childish plea-
In a letter to a London bookseller Jake Schwartz on 15
sure in saying the word spool.
March 1958, Beckett wrote that he had "'four states, in
typescript, with copious notes and dirty corrections, of a The tape dates from when he turned 39. His taped voice
short stage monologue I have just written (in English) for is strong and rather self-important.
Pat Magee. This was composed on the machine from a The voice mentions that hes just celebrated his birthday
tangle of old notes, so I have not the MS to oer you.[3] alone at the wine house jotting down notes in prepa-
According to Ackerley and Gontarski, It was rst pub- ration for the recording session later. His bowel trouble
lished in Evergreen Review 2.5 (summer 1958), then in is still a problem and one obviously exacerbated by eat-
Krapps Last Tape and Embers (Faber, 1959), and Krapps ing too many bananas. The new light above my table is
Last Tape and Other Dramatic Pieces (Grove, 1960).[4] a great improvement,[9] reports the 39-year-old Krapp,
Becketts own translation of the play into French, La before describing how much he enjoys leaving it, wan-
Dernire Bande, was published in Les Lettres Nouvelles dering o into the darkness, so that he can return to the
on 4 March 1959. zone of light which he identies with his essential self.
He notes how quiet the night is.
The available printed texts must not be taken as denitive.
By the mid-1950s Beckett was already talking and work- The voice reports that he has just reviewed an old tape
from when he was in his late twenties. It amuses him to
ing like a director. In a letter to Rossets editorial assis-
tant, Judith Schmidt, on 11 May 1959, Beckett referred comment on his impressions of what he was like in his
twenties and even the 69-year-old Krapp joins in the de-
to the staging of Krapps Last Tape as its 'creation', and
he made numerous signicant changes to the text over the risory laughter. The young man he was back then is de-
years as he was involved in directing the play.[5] scribed as idealistic, even unrealistic in his expectations.
The 39-year-old Krapp looks back on the 20-odd-year-
old Krapp with the same level of contempt as the 20-odd-
1.2 Others year-old Krapp appears to have displayed for the young
man he saw himself for in his late teens. Each can see
The rst German performance, on 28 September 1959, clearly the fool he was but only time will reveal what kind
was directed by Walter Henn at Berlins Schillertheater, of fool he has become.

1
2 4 CHARACTERS

The voice reviews his last year, when his mother died. He play on until the nal curtain. Krapps spool of life
talks about sitting on a bench outside the nursing home is almost wound, and the silent tape is both the time
waiting for the news that she had died. When the mo- it has left to run and the silence into which he must
ment comes he is in the process of throwing a rubber ball pass.[14] Whereas the younger Krapp talks about the re
to a dog. He ends up simply leaving the ball with the in me[13] the tired old man who sits listening is simply
creature even though a part of him regrets not hanging burning to be gone.[11] The title of the play seems ob-
onto it as some kind of memento. Krapp at 69 is more vious, that what we have witnessed is the recording of
interested in his younger selfs use of the rather archaic Krapps nal tape, yet there is an ambiguity: 'last' can
word viduity (Beckett had originally used widowhood mean 'most recent' as well as 'ultimate'. The speaker in
in early drafts) than in the reaction of the voice on the Brownings My Last Duchess is already planning to marry
tape to their mothers passing. He stops listening to look his next duchess ... Still, one hopes for Krapps sake that
up the word in a large dictionary. he will be gone before another year is over.[15]
He returns to the tape. The voice starts to describe the
revelation he experienced at the end of a pier.[10] Krapp
grows impatient and gets worked up when his younger 3 Structure
self starts enthusing about this. He fast-forwards almost
to the end of the tape to escape the onslaught of words. In Waiting for Godot, Beckett uses aspects of Judeo-
Suddenly the mood has changed and he nds himself in Christianity as the template for his play, in Film the
the middle of a description of a romantic liaison between template is the writings of Bishop Berkeley, and in
himself and a woman in a punt. Krapp lets it play out Krapps Last Tape, according to Anthony Cronin, he uses
and then rewinds the tape to hear the complete episode. Manichaeism as a structural device:
Throughout it he remains transxed and visibly relives the
moment while it is retold. The dichotomy of light and dark ... is
central to Manichaean doctrine ... Its adher-
Afterwards, Krapp carefully removes this tape, locates a
ents believed that the world was ruled by evil
fresh one, loads it, checks the back of an envelope where
powers, against which the god of the whole
he has made notes earlier, discards them and starts. He
of creation struggled as yet in vain ... Krapp
is scathing when it comes to his assessment of his thirty-
is in violation of the three seals or prohibi-
nine-year-old self and is glad to see the back of him. He
tions of Manichaeism for the elect: the seal
nds he has nothing he wants to record for posterity, save
of the hands, forbidding engagement in a pro-
the fact he Revelled in the word spool.[11] But he does
fession, the seal of the breast against sexual
mention a trip to the park and attending Vespers, where
desire, and the seal of the mouth, which for-
he dozed o and fell o the pew. He also mentions his
bids the drinking of wine ... Beckett [how-
recent literary disappointments: seventeen copies sold,
ever] seems to have known no more about
presumably of his last book, eleven of which have gone
Manichaeism than is contained in the eleventh
not to interested readers but to foreign libraries; Get-
edition of the Encyclopdia Britannica, which
ting known, he sarcastically summarises. His sex life
he possessed.[16]
has been reduced to periodic visits by an old prostitute
recalling the jibes made in Eh Joe: That slut that comes
on Saturday, you pay her, don't you? ... Penny a hoist
tuppence as long as you like.[12] 4 Characters
Unlike his younger selves, Krapp has nothing good to say
Although there is only one person onstage, there are a
about the man he has become and even the idea of mak-
number of 'characters mentioned throughout. The play
ing one last eort[13] when it comes to his writing upsets
is considered to be Beckett at his most autobiographical,
him. He retreats into memories from his dim and dis-
and it does draw heavily on biographical detail. He once
tant past, gathering holly and walking the dog of a Sun-
told the scholar Lawrence Harvey, though, that his work
day morning. He then remembers the girl on the punt,
does not depend on experience [it is] not a record of
wrenches o the tape he has been recording, throws it
experience. Of course you use it.[17] Beckett takes ele-
away and replays the entire section again from the previ-
ments from his own life, his failed love life, his drinking,
ous tape. It is a scene of masochism reminiscent of Croak
his at the time literary failures and looks where things
in Words and Music, tormenting himself with an image of
might have gone. When, in 1956, Vivian Mercier saw
a womans face. This time he allows the tape to play out.
him in Paris, he told him that he felt 'all dried up, with
It ends with the thirty-nine-year-old Krapp determinedly
nothing left but self-translation.'"[18]
not regretting the choices he has made, certain that what
he would produce in the years to come would more than Krapp
compensate him for any potential loss of happiness.
Krapp makes no response to this but allows the tape to Krapp was originally designated simply A in the rst
draft. The rst appearance of a title was a manuscript
 3

edition to Typescript 2: Crapps Last Tape";[19] the more
familiar Germanic spelling came later. The name Krapp
with its excremental connotations had been used before
by Beckett however. In his rst play, Eleutheria, dating
back to 1947, the protagonist is Victor Krap, a young man
who has decided to retreat from life and do nothing. He
has been described as a world-weary anti-hero, a failed
writer and seedy solipsist, a clear prototype for the later
Krapp.[20]
Krapp (as a boy)
When the thirty-nine-year-old Krapp is talking about his
neighbours ritual singing in the evening he tries to re-
member if he sang as a boy and is unable to do so. He
does recall attending Vespers but it would be unusual
for him to attend Evensong without participating in the
singing of the hymn. Interestingly, the sixty-nine-year-
old Krapp does sing a few lines from the Now the Day
is Over in early performances of the play but Beckett Krapps father
excised this as being too clumsily explicit.[21]
Although no time frame is given, it is likely that sixty-
nine-year-old Krapps memories of being again in the
dingle at Christmas Eve, gathering holly ... [or] on
Croghan on a Sunday morning, in the haze, with the
bitch[13] alludes to Becketts own childhood familial
memories.[22][23][24]
wife of Becketts French Professor at Trinity, who was
himself satirised as 'the Polar Bear' in Dream of Fair to
Middling Women)..[25]
He settled on 'Bianca', who was most likely based on an-
other lecturer, Bianca Esposito, who (along with Walter
Starkie) taught him Italian and cultivated his lifelong pas-
sion for Dante. He took private lessons from Signorina
Esposito as well. Those lessons at 21 Ely Place were
then caricatured in the short story 'Dante and the Lob-
ster'. Kedar Street is not a real location but an anagram of
'darke' or Hebrew for 'black'.[26] Keeping this in mind, the
name may simply have been selected because "bianca"
means white woman in Italian. Little is recorded about
her other than "'a tribute to her eyes. Very warm.'"[27]
Vivian Mercier, who knew Beckett personally, writes:
Although I do not recall his ever using the phrase, Beck-
ett unquestionably regards the eyes as the windows of the
soul.[28]
Krapps father, the only other man mentioned in the play,
is spoken of only very briey. The expression Last ill-
ness suggests he has not been a well man for some time
and dies while Krapp is in his twenties. His own father,
William Beckett, died of a heart attack on 26 June 1933,
when Beckett was twenty-seven.

Krapp (in his twenties) The girl in the green coat

His birth-sign in early drafts is given as Aries, Becketts Becketts rst love, his cousin, Peggy Sinclair, had
own. All we learn about Krapp at this age comes from the deep green eyes and [had a] passionate love of green
tape. Like a lot of young men he is full of aspirations clothing.[29] An allusion to Peggy Sinclair also appears in
his work is starting to take shape and resolutions Dream of Fair to Middling Women in Smeraldina, the lit-
he is already aware that his drinking needs to be curbed. tle emerald". Although the relationship is often cited as
He is becoming resigned to the fact that he might well being a little one-sided, Beckett does recall: Oh, Peggy
have let true love represented by the image of a girl in didnt need any chasing.[30]
a shabby green coat, on a railway-station platform get
away from him. He has settled for an on/o relationship Krapp (aged 39)
with a Bianca but even there his future plans do not
feature her. We learn that his problem with constipation This character does the majority of the talking through-
has been ongoing since at least this time. He disparages out the play. His voice is contained on Tape 5 from Box
his youth and is glad it is over. The thirty-nine-year-old
3. His voice is strong and rather pompous. He has cele-
Krapp estimates that the tape he had been listening to was
brated his birthday alone in an empty wine house before
made some ten or twelve years earlier. If it was twelve returning home to consume three bananas. As has be-
then he would have been twenty-seven at the time it was come his practice on his birthday he makes a tape looking
recorded. back at who he was, assessing who he is and anticipating
what might be to come. His is as disparaging of the young
Bianca man he was in his twenties as he was then of the youth he
had been thinking about when he made that earlier tape.
In the earlier drafts the woman with whom the young He records the death of his mother, an epiphany at the
Krapp lived [later named Bianca"] was rst named 'Alba' end of a pier and an idyllic moment in a punt.
(a character in Dream of Fair to Middling Women mod-
elled on Ethna MacCarthy whom he had loved when he Old Mrs McGlome
was a young man), then 'Celia' (the name of the green-
eyed prostitute with whom Murphy cohabits in Murphy), This character is based on Miss Beamish, an eccen-
then 'Furry' (nickname of Anne Rudmose-Brown, the tric novelist from Connacht whom Beckett had met in
4 4 CHARACTERS

Roussillon, while hiding during World War II. Whether a small grey punctured rubber ball[39] is the last object
the real Miss Beamish did actually sing regularly ev- contemplated before Fancy dies. The ball had already ap-
ery evening is ... debatable. Beckett did not remember peared in All That Fall: Jerry returns a kind of ball[40] to
this.[31] Mr. Rooney. Although not an obvious symbol of death,
this ball is a signicant motif of childhood grief for Beck-
The dark young beauty ett though none of his biographers propose that the pres-
ence of the dog is anything more than artistic license.
There appears to be no direct correlation between this
character and anyone living. The black-and-white im- The girl in the punt
agery is strong here: her white uniform and the big
black hooded perambulator.[32] Krapp also remembers
Beckett makes the relationship of this woman to Krapp
this womans eyes as being "[l]ike ... chrysolite!"[32]
clear when "[i]n 1975, directing Pierre Chabert in Paris,
Rosemary Pountney observes Beckett changed Beckett said: 'I thought of writing a play on the oppo-
"moonstone" to chrysolite, an olive-green coloured site situation, with Mrs Krapp, the girl in the punt, nag-
mineral, in Typescript 4.[33] ging away behind him, in which case his failure and his
[41]
She observes also that Beckett made a direct connection solitude would be exactly the same.'" In her biogra-
... with Othello, a play in which dark and light imagery phy of Beckett, Deirdre Bair deduces that the girl in the
is central, as in the margin of the text that he used for punt may be Peggy Sinclair because of the references
the 1973 London production, on page 15 where the word to E and to the Baltic": in July 1929 Beckett va-
'chrysolite' occurs ... he writes: cationed with the Sinclairs in one of the smaller resort
towns along the Baltic Sea. Summer, traditionally the
time for light reading, found Peggy tearfully engrossed in
If heaven would make me such another
Theodor Fontane's novel, E Briest. Beckett read it too,
world
but with more detachment than Peggy, who wept and suf-
fered as Es indelity ended her marriage.[42] Talking
Of one entire and perfect chrysolite
to James Knowlson, a few days before his death, Beckett
Id not have sold her for it
said that he did not remember the scene this way, how-
ever, denying that girl in the boat ... had anything at all to
Othello V2. do with his cousin, Peggy.[43] Knowlson feels that there
is little doubt the source for the girl with the haunting eyes
Like Othello, too, Pountney continues, Krapp has lost is Ethna MacCarthy. For, as Dream of Fair to Middling
his love through his own folly.[34] Women had made clear ... the 'Alba', who, on Becketts
own admission, was closely modelled on Ethna, had eyes
Krapps mother like dark, deep pools.[44] Beckett left no doubt however
when he told Jean Martin, whilst rehearsing the play in
1970, that the girl was modelled on Ethna.[45] On 11 De-
Becketts mother, May, died on 25 August 1950 in
cember 1957 Beckett learned that Ethna was terminally
the Merrion Nursing Home which overlooked Dublins
ill and regularly wrote uncharacteristically long letters un-
Grand Canal. Beckett had made the trip over in the early
til her death. When he completed the play he wrote her:
summer to be with her. By 24 July medical opinion con-
Ive written in English a stage monologue for Pat Magee
rmed that she was dying. During that last long month he
which I think you will like if no one else.[46]
used to walk disconsolately alone along the towpath of
the Grand Canal.[35] At one point in the recollection, the young Krapp leans
over the young woman to shade her from the sun. Let
Towards the end she was oblivious to his presence. Her
me in, he says. This caused the Lord Chamberlain some
death took place while he was sitting on a bench by the
concerns when the play was rst presented before him
canal. At a certain point he happened to look up. The
to grant a license. He believed that what was being sug-
blinds of his mothers window, a dirty red-brown aair,
[36] gested was a desire for sexual penetration and was not
was down. She was dead. A drawn blind, an old
convinced that Beckett was simply alluding to her eyes. It
custom signifying death, also makes an appearance in
[37] was not until a mere three weeks before the plays opening
Rockaby: let down the blind and down.
that the objection was dropped. In 1982 Beckett, in re-
sponse to a similar suggestion from one of James Knowl-
The little white dog sons postgraduate students, said with a chuckle, 'Tell her
to read her texts more carefully. She'll see that Krapp
When Krapps mother died, he was throwing a ball for a would need to have a penis at an angle of a hundred and
little white dog. He says he will keep it forever: But I eighty degrees to make coitus possible in the position he
gave it away to the dog.[38] Signicantly the ball is black is in!'"[47] a position that Rosette Lamont proposes also
to contrast with the white of the dog. In All Strange Away suggests that of a suckling babe.[48]

Krapp (aged 69)
Beckett would not be 69 until 1975 so, from his perspec-
tive, with Krapp a proxy for him, the action is set in the
future. The rst line of the play explicitly sets it 'in the
future',[49] although nothing onstage reveals this. Beck-
ett wrote this play shortly before he turned 52 years old.
As it happens, with Waiting for Godot, success had found
him but, at 39, the future must have seemed a lot bleaker
for the writer, the Second World War was ending and all
Beckett had had published were a few poems, a collection
of short stories and the novel, Murphy. Beckett had this
to say about the drained old man we see onstage: Krapp
sees very clearly that hes through with his work, with love
and religion.[50] He told Rick Cluchey, whom he directed
in 1977, that Krapp was in no way senile [but has] some-
thing frozen about him [and is] lled up to his teeth with
bitterness.[51] Habit, the great deadener[52] has proven
more tenacious than inspiration. His present concerns
revolve around the gratication of those very bodily ap-
petites that, earlier, he had resolved should be out of his
life. Eating bananas and drinking have become a [daily
routine]. Of the physical activities that he once consid-
ered excesses only sex has come to play a reduced part
in his lonely existence[53] in the form of periodic visits
from an old prostitute.
Although this is a play about memory, the sixty-nine-
year-old Krapp himself remembers very little. Virtually
all the recollections come from the tape. As evidenced
most clearly in the novel Murphy, Beckett had a decent
understanding of a variety of mental illnesses includ-
ing Korsakos Alcoholic Syndrome"A hypomaniac
teaching slosh to a Korsakows syndrome.[54] which is
characterised by powerful amnesic symptoms accompa-
nied by intestinal obstruction.
In his focus on chronic alcohol consumption, Narinder
Kapur explains in Memory Disorders in Clinical Practice
that it can lead to marked memory loss and generalised
cognitive defects, as well as disorientation for time and
also place. More recent memories are likely to be for-
gotten than remote memories, for memory loss shows
a temporal gradient with greater sparing of items from
earlier years.[55] Krapps gathering of red-berried holly
in the dingle could be an example of the relatively in-
tact remote memory[56] that preceded Krapps apparent
addiction to alcohol.
Krapp is not a textbook case. He is an individual with his
own individual symptomology but he is more than a list
of symptoms. Bananas contain pectin, a soluble bre that
can help normalise movement through the digestive tract
and ease constipation. Bananas can also aggravate consti-
pation especially in young children. It depends what the
root cause of the problem is. They are also high in Vita-
mins A and C as well as niacin, riboavin and thiamine
and one of the root causes of Korsakos Syndrome is thi-
amine deciency; eating bananas would be good for him.
It is easy to get caught up in this kind of over-analysis
5
to the detriment of the play as a whole. "[A]ttempts to
demonstrate that Becketts characters conform to specic
psychological syndromes so often turn into will-o-the-
wisp pursuits. Certainly, Beckett would not deny that psy-
chologists have oered very useful descriptions of mental
activity. But their theories are typically no more than ini-
tial steps in an understanding of mental processes, frag-
mented bits of knowledge which should not be taken for
universal principles.[57] It is important to remember that
Krapp has not simply forgotten his past but he has con-
sciously and systematically rejected it as one way of re-
assuring himself that he has made the right decisions in
his yearly word letting.[58]
E Briest
In the past year Krapp has been re-reading Fontanes E
Briest, a page a day, with tears again, he says, Could
have been happy with her, up there on the Baltic....[59]
Existing only on the printed page this fantasy woman is
perhaps the most black-and-white of all Krapps women.
Like the girl in the punt and the nursemaid mentioned ear-
lier, perhaps to contrast with his inner re, Once again
Beckett situates Krapps memory on some side near the
water.[60]
Fanny
Just as Krapps name is a vulgar pun, so is the name Beck-
ett gave to the woman who visits him from time to time,
whom he describes as a bony old ghost of a whore.[11]
As Fanny is an old ghost, all Krapps women are g-
uratively ghosts, really, dependent for their existence
on Krapps bitter-sweet recording of them, according to
Katherine Worth.[61]
"Fanny" is a slang British expression for the female gen-
itals woman reduced to a function. Fanny is also a
commonly used diminutive of Frances, and Beckett oc-
casionally referred to his aunt, Frances Cissie Sinclair,
as Fanny.[62]
Krapp refers to her visits as better than a kick in
the crutch.[63] In the 1985 television version, Beckett
changed this phrase to better than the nger and the
thumb,[64] an unambiguous reference to masturbation
that would never have escaped the British Lord Cham-
berlain in the fties.
Krapps vision at last, on the pier at Dn Laoghaire
In an earlier draft of the play Beckett uses 'beacon' and
'anemometer' rather than 'lighthouse' and 'wind-gauge'.
The anemometer on the East Pier of Dn Laoghaire was
one of the worlds rst. [It is] widely regarded as a mirror
reection of Becketts own revelation. Yet it is dierent
both in circumstance and kind.[65]
6 5 NOTABLE PERFORMANCES OF KRAPP

Beckett wrote to Richard Ellmann: 'All the jetty and The general eect was strangely dclass but
howling wind are imaginary. It happened to me, sum- still indubitably Irish and thus ideally tted for
mer 1945, in my mothers little house, named New Place, the performance of Beckett ... As an actor, he
across the road from Cooldrinagh.'"[66] had the good sense to see that one played Beck-
He summarised what this experience signied for him: ett for the weight and mood of the words and
the situation without bothering about the ulti-
mate philosophical import.[72]
I realised that Joyce had gone as far as one
could in the direction of knowing more, [be-
ing] in control of ones material. He was al- 5.2 Donald Davis
ways adding to it; you only have to look at his
proofs to see that. I realised that my own way The Canadian actor Donald Davis played Krapp in the
was in impoverishment, in lack of knowledge North American premiere production of Krapps Last
and in taking away, in subtracting rather than Tape. The New York Times reported that Davis won an
in adding.[67] Obie Award in 1960 for his performance as the lonely,
solitary Krapp, playing the tapes of his life and re-
The tape recorder experiencing decades of regret.[2] Later, Krapps Last
Tape, directed by Alan Schneider, was a long-running
Beckett has applied character to non-human elements in performance at the Provincetown Playhouse, for which a
his plays before, e.g. the light in Play, the music in Words 33 RPM recording was issued (see article and liner notes).
and Music. Beckett instructed the actor Pierre Chabert
in his 1975 Paris production of the play 'to become as
5.3 Rick Cluchey
much as possible one body with the machine ... The spool
[68]
is his whole life.'" Krapp no longer owns the memories
Co-Founder of the San Quentin Drama Workshop was
on the tapes. His mind is no longer capable of holding
directed by Beckett in 1977, Berlin.
onto them. The recorder also serves as proxy. When John
Hurt, as Krapp, is transxed by the retelling of the events
in the punt he literally cradles the machine as if it were the 5.4 Max Wall
woman recalling Magees original performance; Beckett
took pains to point this out to Alan Schneider, who was at Max Wall performed Krapp on a number of occasions,
the time preparing his own version of the play, in a letter including Londons Greenwich Theatre (1975 directed
dated 21 November 1958, and incorporated the gesture by Patrick Magee[73] ) and Riverside Studios (1986).
in future productions in which he was involved.[69]
Later, on 4 January 1960, Beckett wrote a more detailed
letter describing another unexpected revelation of that 5.5 John Hurt
earlier performance, the beautiful and quite accidental
eect in London of the luminous eye burning up as the John Hurt performed the role of Krapp for the version
machine runs on in silence and the light goes down.[70] directed by Atom Egoyan for the project Beckett on Film,
which was broadcast on television in 2001 and available
on DVD in the box set or individually. In November
5 Notable performances of Krapp 2011, directed by Michael Colgan, he reprised the role
pre-Broadway at the Shakespeare Theatre Company in
Washington DC[74] followed by a limited Broadway run.
5.1 Patrick Magee He used the tape recordings from the 2001 production in
the performance.[75] In December 2011, again directed
Beckett told Patrick Magee, the original Krapp, that his by Michael Colgan, he reprised the role in New York
voice was the one which he heard inside his mind. Thus City at the Brooklyn Academy of Music as part of the
it seems likely that the return to English was a matter of BAM 2011 Next Wave Festival.[76] He once again took
expediency because of the English-speaking actor.[71] up the role in Dublins Gate Theatre for 10 performances
in March 2013.[77]
Magee had a harsh, gravely voice which
had little supercial charm but had a hypnotic
eect on the listener ... He was grey-haired 5.6 Harold Pinter
but ageless and could combine debility with
menace, as Beckett characters with their sup- Further information: Harold Pinter 20022008
pressed violence often do ... [H]e had devel-
oped a rather strange accent with only faint As part of the 50th anniversary season of the Royal
Irish overtones and prolonged vowel sounds, Court Theatre, in October 2006, directed by Ian Rick-
5.11 Gerard Murphy 7

ceiving critical acclaim across the board. This was in a

double bill with A Kind of Alaska by Harold Pinter in
which Bremmer also appeared. They were both directed
by Simon Godwin.

5.11 Gerard Murphy

In 2012, at Glasgow's Citizens Theatre, Gerard Murphy
performed the role, even though he was suering spinal
cord compression due to prostate cancer.[83]

5.12 Robert Wilson

Krapp, as portrayed by Harold Pinter at the Royal Court Theatre
in October 2006
He is slated to perform at the Alexander Kasser Theater
on the campus of Montclair State University in March of
son, English playwright Harold Pinter performed the role 2016 [84]
of Krapp in a sold-out limited run of nine performances
to great critical acclaim.[78][79][80]
5.7 Corin Redgrave
Corin Redgrave performed the role of Krapp for BBC
Radio 3 in 2006 a few months after he had suered a
major heart attack. The production was rebroadcast on
BBC Radio 3 on 16 May 2010 as part of a double bill
with a 2006 production of Embers.
5.8 Brian Dennehy
Brian Dennehy performed the role of Krapp during the
2008 Stratford Shakespeare Festival and again in 2010 at
the Goodman Theatre of Chicago, both times directed by
Jennifer Tarver. The Beckett one-act was paired at both
venues with Eugene O'Neill's Hughie (directed by Robert
Falls), also a one-act, and also performed by Dennehy, in
the lead role of Erie Smith. The show ran at the Goodman
Theatre from 16 January through 28 February 2010. A
Broadway run is also planned.[81]
5.9 Michael Gambon
Robert Wilson performed Krapp at the Barbican, Lon-
don, in June 2015.
6 Media recordings
Beckett opposed vehemently the transfer of some of his
works from one medium to another, but he did not op-
pose such recordings of Krapps Last Tape as much as
he did others. For example, A gramophone record-
ing (New York: Spoken Arts #788, 1960), based on the
original American production, was distributed by Argo
(RG 220), and by HEAR, Home Educational Records,
London (1964),[85] and It was often adapted for tele-
vision with his encouragement. The rst BBC version
was produced by Peter Luke, featuring Cyril Cusack (13
November 1963). Approached by Westdeutscher Rund-
funk, Cologne, to permit a television version of his 1969
Schiller-Theatre Das letzte Band [the German title of the
play], Beckett wrote a set of Suggestions for TV Krapp,
which was broadcast [on] 28th October 1969.[86]
The play has subsequently been broadcast on radio,
turned into an opera (see below) and lmed as part of
the Beckett on Film project and for the DVD of Pin-
ters Royal Court performance, both of which have been
shown on television.

In April 2010 Irish actor Michael Gambon continued his 7 Musical adaptations
relationship with both Beckett and the Gate Theatre when
he returned to the Dublin stage as Krapp for a limited There have been several musical adaptations of Krapps
run which was followed by a transfer to Londons West Last Tape, most notably the opera Krapp, ou, La dernire
End.[82] bande by composer Marcel Mihalovici. American com-
poser Earl Kim alludes to the work within his Gooseber-
ries, she said (1967), part of the four-part cycle Exercises
5.10 Richard Bremmer en Route. The Hungarian composer Gyula Csap has cre-
ated the work Krapps Last Tape - after Samuel Beckett
Richard Bremmer took on the eponymous role of Krapp (1975) loosely inspired by Becketts play.[87] This theatri-
at the Bristol Old Vic between April and May 2012, re- cal work is for a violinist-actor, a tape recorder, four
8 9 NOTES
spotlights and a sine wave generator.[88] In 1999, the En- [10] Vivian Mercier, Beckett/Beckett (London: Souvenir Press,
glish experimental composer, Michael Parsons, adapted
Krapps Last Tape for piano, two pre-recorded pianos, and
[11] Samuel Beckett, Collected Shorter Plays of Samuel Beckett
voice on tape. The piece, specically written for John
Tilbury, was called Krapp Music.
8 Allusions in popular culture
The play was memorably parodied in the television sketch
comedy The Fast Show, in which as a reference to Max
Wall ctional music hall comedian Arthur Atkinson
played a comically more stoic version of Krapp.[89] It is
also the title of a track on Fredrik Thordendals solo al-
bum Sol Niger Within. A preguring of the play, titled,
Krapp, 39 written and performed by Michael Laurence
and directed by George Demas, premiered at the 2008
New York International Fringe Festival and begins its
commercial run O Broadway at The Soho Playhouse in
New York City on 13 January 2009. The piece follows
an actors obsession with the character Krapp.
9 Notes
[1] University of Reading Library MS 1227/7/7/1, as cited in
James Knowlson, "Krapps Last Tape: the evolution of a
play, Journal of Beckett Studies 1.1. : The rst known
holograph is contained in the t 56 notebook in Reading
University Library. It is headed Magee monologue and is
dated 20 February 1958.
[2] Gussow, Mel (January 28, 1998). Donald Davis, 69, Ac-
tor in Challenging Roles. The New York Times.
[3] Letter to Jake Schwartz, a bookseller in London, as qtd. in
Rosemary Pountney, Theatre of Shadows: Samuel Beck-
etts Drama: 19561976 (Gerrards Cross: Colin Smythe,
1988) 136; the quoted letter is held at the Beckett Collec-
tion, Humanities Research Center, University of Texas at
Austin, along with the typescript to which it refers.
[4] C. J. Ackerley, and S. E. Gontarski, eds., The Faber
Companion to Samuel Beckett (London: Faber and Faber,
2006) 302.
[5] Stanley E. Gontarski, Beckett in Performance 200, in
Lois Oppenheim, ed., Palgrave Advances in Samuel Beck-
ett Studies (London: Palgrave, 2004).
[6] Samuel Beckett, Collected Shorter Plays of Samuel Beckett
(London: Faber and Faber, 1984) 55.
[7] Anthony Cronin, Samuel Beckett: The Last Modernist
(London: Flamingo, 1997) 486.
[8] Martin Held talks to Ronald Hayman", in The Times, Sat-
urday Review, 25 April 1970, as qtd. in James Knowl-
son and John Pilling, Frescoes of the Skull (London: John
Calder, 1979) 82.
[9] Samuel Beckett, Collected Shorter Plays of Samuel Beckett
(London: Faber and Faber, 1984) 57
1990) 6.
(London: Faber and Faber, 1984) 62.
[12] Samuel Beckett, Collected Shorter Plays of Samuel Beckett
(London: Faber and Faber, 1984) 203.
[13] Samuel Beckett, Collected Shorter Plays of Samuel Beckett
(London: Faber and Faber, 1984) 63.
[14] Rosemary Pountney, Theatre of Shadows: Samuel Beck-
etts Drama: 19561976 (Gerrards Cross: Colin Smythe,
1988) 171.
[15] Vivian Mercier, Beckett/Beckett (London: Souvenir Press,
1990) 184.
[16] Anthony Cronin, Samuel Beckett: The Last Modernist
(London: Flamingo, 1997) 485, 486.
[17] Undated interview with Lawrence Harvey, qtd. in James
Knowlson, Damned to Fame: The Life of Samuel Beckett
(London: Bloomsbury, 1996) 371, 372.
[18] Anthony Cronin, Samuel Beckett: The Last Modernist
(London: Flamingo, 1997) 472
[19] Rosemary Pountney, Theatre of Shadows: Samuel Beck-
etts Drama: 19561976 (Gerrards Cross: Colin Smythe,
1988) 138.
[20] Marius Buning (President, Dutch Samuel Beckett So-
ciety), Eleutheria Revisited, public lecture delivered at
Teatro Quijano, Ciudad Real, Spain, 2 December 1997.
[21] James Knowlson, "Krapps Last Tape: The Evolution of
a play, 195875, Journal of Beckett Studies 1 (Winter
1976): 54.
[22] D. Katz, Becketts Measures: Principles of Pleasure in
Molloy and First Love", Modern Fiction Studies 49.2 (Sum-
mer 2003): 246260: Collating the accounts of Becketts
two major recent biographers, it seems that in 1926 Beck-
ett ran over and killed his mothers Kerry Blue bitch.
[23] A 'dingle' is a small wooded hollow"; cf. dell, valley.
[24] Cronin, Anthony (1999). Samuel Beckett: The Last Mod-
ernist. Yew York: Da Capo Press. p. 233. ISBN
0684808722.
[25] C. J. Ackerley, and Stanley E. Gontarski, eds., The Faber
Companion to Samuel Beckett (London: Faber and Faber,
2006) 303
[26] C. J. Ackerley, and Stanley E. Gontarski, eds., The Faber
Companion to Samuel Beckett (London: Faber and Faber,
2006) 182.
[27] Samuel Beckett, Collected Shorter Plays of Samuel Beckett
(London: Faber and Faber, 1984), 58.
[28] Mercier, V., Beckett/Beckett (London: Souvenir Press,
1990), p 131
[29] Bair, D., Samuel Beckett: A Biography (London: Vintage,
1990), p 79

[30] James Knowlson and E. Knowlson, eds, Beckett Remem-
bering / Remembering Beckett (London: Bloomsbury,
2006) 37.
[31] Interview with James Knowlson, July 1989, cited in James
Knowlson, Damned to Fame: The Life of Samuel Beckett
(London: Bloomsbury, 1996) 330, 331.
[32] Samuel Beckett, Collected Shorter Plays of Samuel Beckett
(London: Faber and Faber, 1984) 59.
[33] Rosemary Pountney, Theatre of Shadows: Samuel Beck-
etts Drama: 19561976 (Gerrards Cross: Colin Smythe,
1988) 160.
[34] Rosemary Pountney, Theatre of Shadows: Samuel Beck-
etts Drama: 19561976 (Gerrards Cross: Colin Smythe,
1988) 139.
[35] James Knowlson, Damned to Fame: The Life of Samuel
Beckett (London: Bloomsbury, 1996) 382.
[36] Anthony Cronin, Samuel Beckett: The Last Modernist
(London: Flamingo, 1997) 407.
[37] Cronin, citing Samuel Beckett, Collected Shorter Plays of
Samuel Beckett (London: Faber and Faber, 1984) 281.
[38] Samuel Beckett, Collected Shorter Plays of Samuel Beckett
(London: Faber and Faber, 1984) 60.
[39] Samuel Beckett, All Strange Away, in Beckett Short No
3 (London: Calder Publication [1976] 1999) 33.
[40] Samuel Beckett, Collected Shorter Plays of Samuel Beckett
(London: Faber and Faber, 1984) 38.
[41] C. J. Ackerley and Stanley E. Gontarski, eds., The Faber
Companion to Samuel Beckett (London: Faber and Faber,
2006) 303.
[42] Deirdre Bair, Samuel Beckett: A Biography (London: Vin-
tage, 1990) 91.
[43] Interview with James Knowlson, 17 November 1989, qtd.
in James Knowlson, Damned to Fame: The Life of Samuel
Beckett (London: Bloomsbury, 1996) 443. From the
emendations made by James Knowlson in Beckett Remem-
bering / Remembering Beckett published in 2006, it ap-
pears that Becketts memory about those events could have
been inaccurate.
[44] Interview with James Knowlson, 13 September 1989, qtd.
in James Knowlson, Damned to Fame: The Life of Samuel
Beckett (London: Bloomsbury, 1996) 443.
[45] James Knowlson, Damned to Fame: The Life of Samuel
Beckett (London: Bloomsbury, 1996) 576.
[46] Letter to Ethna MacCarthy, 2 June 1958, qtd. in James
Knowlson, Damned to Fame: The Life of Samuel Beckett
(London: Bloomsbury, 1996) 442.
[47] James Knowlson, Damned to Fame: The Life of Samuel
Beckett (London: Bloomsbury, 1996) 451.
[48] Rosette Lamont, Becketts Eh Joe: Lending an Ear to the
Anima, 234 in Women in Beckett: Performance and Criti-
cal Perspectives, ed. Linda Ben-Zvi (Urbana and Chicago:
U of Illinois P, 1992) 234.
9
[49] Rosemary Pountney, Theatre of Shadows: Samuel Beck-
etts Drama: 19561976 (Gerrards Cross: Colin Smythe,
1988) 137: A specic date variously tried out at the open-
ing of Typescript 3 is ... subsequently omitted: 'April
1986. A late evening [sic] in 1985 the nineteen eighties
[amended to simply] 'in the future' in the nal text.
[50] Martin Held talks to Ronald Hayman", The Times 25
April 1970, Saturday Review; qtd. in James Knowlson
and John Pilling, Frescoes of the Skull (London: John
Calder, 1979) 82.
[51] Anthony Cronin, Samuel Beckett: The Last Modernist
(London: Flamingo, 1997) 484, 485.
[52] Samuel Beckett, Waiting for Godot, (1956; London: Faber
and Faber, 1988) 91.
[53] James Knowlson and John Pilling, Frescoes of the Skull
(London: John Calder, 1979) 81.
[54] Samuel Beckett, Murphy, (London: John Calder, 1963)
96
[55] N. Kapur, Memory Disorders in Clinical Practice (London:
Butterworth, 1988) 158.
[56] P. Whitehouse, ed., Dementia (Philadelphia: F A Davis,
1998) 328.
[57] R. Rabinovitz, Beckett and Psychology, Journal of
Beckett Studies 11/12 (December 1989).
[58] J. Malkin, Matters of Memory in Krapps Last Tape and
Not I", Journal of Dramatic Theory and Criticism 11.2
(Spring 1997): 29.
[59] Samuel Beckett, Collected Shorter Plays of Samuel Beckett
(London: Faber and Faber, 1984) 62.
[60] C. R. Lyons, Samuel Beckett, MacMillan Modern Drama-
tists (London: MacMillan Education, 1983) 7.
[61] Katherine Worth, Women in Becketts Radio and Tele-
vision Plays 236, in Women in Beckett: Performance
and Critical Perspectives, ed. Linda Ben-Zvi (Urbana and
Chicago: University of Illinois Press, 1992).
[62] Deirdre Bair, Samuel Beckett: A Biography (London: Vin-
tage, 1990) 520; cf. James Knowlson, in Damned to
Fame: The Life of Samuel Beckett (London: Bloomsbury,
1996) ; Knowlson uses the alternative spelling Fannie
instead of Fanny.
[63] Samuel Beckett, S., Collected Shorter Plays of Samuel
Beckett (London: Faber and Faber, 1984) 62.
[64] Beckett directs Beckett, directed by Walter Asmus based
on the mise en scne by Samuel Beckett) starring Rick
Cluchley.
[65] James Knowlson, Damned to Fame: The Life of Samuel
Beckett (London: Bloomsbury, 1996) 352, citing Edna
O'Brien, The Beckett Country (Dublin: The Black Cat
Press, 1986) 83, 355 n.20.
[66] Letter to Richard Ellmann, 27 January 1986; qtd. in John
Knowlson, Damned to Fame: The Life of Samuel Beckett
(London: Bloomsbury, 1996) 772 n. 55.
10 11 EXTERNAL LINKS

[67] Samuel Beckett, interview with James Knowlson, 27 Oct. [85] C. J. Ackerley, and Stanley E. Gontarski, eds., The Faber
1989, qtd. in Knowlson, Damned to Fame: The Life of Companion to Samuel Beckett, (London: Faber and Faber,
Samuel Beckett (London: Bloomsbury, 1996) 352. 2006) 302.

[68] Beckett as Director, Gambit 7.28 (1976): 62,61; qtd. in
Rosemary Pountney, Theatre of Shadows: Samuel Beck-
etts Drama: 19561976 (Gerrards Cross: Colin Smythe,
1988) 173, 57.
[69] Letter to Alan Schneider, 21 Nov 1958, qtd. in M. Har-
mon, ed., No Author Better Served: The Correspondence of
Samuel Beckett and Alan Schneider (Cambridge: Harvard
UP, 1998) 50.
[70] Letter to Alan Schneider, 4 Jan 1960, qtd. in M. Har-
mon, ed., No Author Better Served: The Correspondence
of Samuel Beckett and Alan Schneider (Cambridge: Har-
vard UP, 1998) 59.
[86] C. Zilliacus, Beckett and Broadcasting: A Study of the
Works of Samuel Beckett for Television and Radio (bo,
bo Akademi, 1976); C. J. Ackerley, and Stanley E.
Gontarski, eds., The Faber Companion to Samuel Beckett,
(London: Faber and Faber, 2006) 302.
[87] Gyula Csap", The Modern Word, accessed 22 Septem-
ber 2007.
[88] Krapps Last Tape after Samuel Beckett (1975), The Mod-
ern Word, accessed 22 September 2007.
[89] The Fast Show Arthur Atkinson Complete Part 11 on
YouTube

[71] Deirdre Bair, Samuel Beckett: A Biography (London: Vin-

tage, 1990) 521. 10 References
[72] Anthony Cronin, Samuel Beckett: The Last Modernist
(London: Flamingo, 1997) 470, 471. Knowlson, James. "Krapps Last Tape: The Evolu-
tion of a Play. Journal of Beckett Studies 1.1 (Win-
[73] Going Legit. maxwall.org. Retrieved 2 September ter 1976).
2009.

[74] Marks, Peter (30 November 2011). The gentle authority

of John Hurt in 'Krapps Last Tape'". The Washington
Post. Retrieved 2 December 2011.
[75] Rehm, Diane. Diane Rehm Show 1 December 2011.
Actor John Hurt interview. WAMU Radio. Retrieved 1
December 2011.
[76] Isherwood, Charles (8 December 2011). Unspooling
Memories From the Soul on a Machine. The New York
Times.
[77] Gate Theatre Krapps Last Tape. Gate Theatre. 6
March 2013.
11 External links
The short lm Krapps Last Tape (1990) is available
for free download at the Internet Archive
Krapps Last Tape, dir. Atom Egoyan, perf. John
Hurt, Beckett on Film, 2000. (Contains Synopsis
and other information and features about the DVD.)
Krapps Last Tape, dir. Ian Rickson, perf. Harold
Pinter, at the Jerwood Theatre Upstairs, Royal Court
Theatre 1224 Oct 2006.

[78] Alan Cowell, For Harold Pinter at 76, a Sense of Valedic-
tion: In Beckett Play, 'It is beyond acting' ", The Interna-
tional Herald Tribune 21 Oct 2006, accessed 22 Septem-
ber 2007.
[79] Michael Billington, Krapps Last Tape, The Guardian
16 Oct 2006, accessed 22 September 2007.
[80] Nicholas de Jongh, Riveting Five-Star Perfor-
mance, The Evening Standard, 16 Oct 2006, rpt.
in thisislondon.co.uk: The Entertainment Guide, accessed
22 September 2007.
Krapps Last Tape at the Internet Movie Database
2007 (TV version), dir. Ian Rickson, perf. Harold
Pinter, lmed at the Jerwood Theatre Upstairs,
Royal Court Theatre, Oct. 2007.
Krapps Last Tape at the Internet Movie Database,
dir. Tom Skipp, perf. Peter Shreve, 2007.
Goodman Theatre 2009 production

[81] Hughie/Krapps Last Tape. Goodman Theatre.

Archived from the original on 28 February 2010.
Retrieved 10 November 2011.

[82] http://www.gate-theatre.ie/programme/138

[83] Coveney, Michael (28 August 2013). Gerard Murphy

obituary. The Guardian. Retrieved 28 August 2013.

[84] http://www.peakperfs.org/peak-programming-2015-16/
krapp/
 11

12 Text and image sources, contributors, and licenses

12.1 Text
Krapps Last Tape Source: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Krapp{}s_Last_Tape?oldid=765926668 Contributors: Paul A, Rossami,
Stismail, Dysprosia, Cleduc, Muresan, David Gerard, Henry Flower, Danijobi, Ganymead, Yossarian, MakeRocketGoNow, Ericamick,
Ashley Pomeroy, Echuck215, Melaen, Blainegarrett~enwiki, Ceyockey, Mel Etitis, Matthew Platts, Jacj, Mandarax, Graham87, BD2412,
Rjwilmsi, NYScholar, BonsaiViking, SmackBot, Chris the speller, Sadads, SpiderJon, Smerus, Ohconfucius, MusicMaker5376, John,
Dl2000, Gil Gamesh, Joekane, JohnCD, Supermanhaiku, Penbat, Typewritten, Cydebot, Playtime, Cyhawk, Red Director, Crowish,
In Defense of the Artist, Nick Number, Nicholas0, Storkk, Sluzzelin, Barek, MER-C, Musanim, F. Simon Grant, Magioladitis, Rows-
dower45, Trusilver, Skullketon, Plasticup, STBotD, Retinalsummer, Davecrosby uk, Jimmy4559, Nrswanson, Someguy1221, Softlaven-
der, Patoldanga'r Tenida, StAnselm, The Stickler, JL-Bot, ImageRemovalBot, Ironman1104, Martarius, GorillaWarfare, DionysosProteus,
Trivialist, Excirial, Homonihilis, Estrellasonora, Bloovee1, Stefano510, SchreiberBike, Boleyn, Bilsonius, EraserGirl, Addbot, Tassedethe,
Ecragg, Lightbot, Zorrobot, Luckas-bot, Yobot, AnomieBOT, Freond, LilHelpa, PraeceptorIP, Cyphoidbomb, Fewskulchor, FrescoBot,
Anna Roy, Full-date unlinking bot, Jordgette, Lotje, Caractecus, Jfmantis, RjwilmsiBot, Rwood128, WildBot, EmausBot, Vsop.de, Clue-
Bot NG, IJVin, Wbm1058, LouisAlain, CAWylie, Cyberbot II, Khazar2, Dobie80, 509380, Heritager, Mad Pedant, Riskybusiness88,
Pmccarthy45, KasparBot, Slipped Winegrid, Jmcgnh, Bender the Bot and Anonymous: 78

12.2 Images
File:Edit-clear.svg Source: https://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/en/f/f2/Edit-clear.svg License: Public domain Contributors: The
Tango! Desktop Project. Original artist:
The people from the Tango! project. And according to the meta-data in the le, specically: Andreas Nilsson, and Jakub Steiner (although
minimally).
File:HaroldPinterKrappsLastTape.jpg Source: https://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/en/b/bb/HaroldPinterKrappsLastTape.jpg Li-
cense: Fair use Contributors: ? Original artist: ?
File:Question_book-new.svg Source: https://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/en/9/99/Question_book-new.svg License: Cc-by-sa-3.0
Contributors:
Created from scratch in Adobe Illustrator. Based on Image:Question book.png created by User:Equazcion Original artist:
Tkgd2007

12.3 Content license

Creative Commons Attribution-Share Alike 3.0