From "Play," 1962

Woman 1 : I said to him, Give her up. I swore by all I held most sacred--

Woman 2 : One morning as I was sitting stitching by the open window she burst in and flew at me. Give him up, she screamed, he's mine. Her photographs were kind to her. Seeing her now for the first time full length in the flesh I understood why he preferred me.

Man : We were not long together when she smelled the rat. Give up that whore, she said, or I'll cut my throat [hiccup] --pardon--so help me God. I knew she could have no proof. So I told her I did not know what she was talking about.

Woman 2 : What are you talking about? I said, stitching away. Someone yours? Give up whom? I smell you off him, she screamed, he stinks of bitch.

Woman 1 : Though I had him dogged for months by a first-rate man, no shadow of proof was forthcoming. And there was no denying that he continued as . . . assiduous as ever. This, and his horror of the merely Platonic thing, made me sometimes wonder if I were not accusing him unjustly. Yes.

Man : What have you to complain of ? I said. Have I been neglecting you? How could we be together in the way we are if there were someone else? Loving her as I did, with all my heart, I could not but feel sorry for her.

Samuel Beckett, "Krapp's Last Tape," short clip

Portrait of the character as a young man.




Though I've never seen it, or even read it, I love the idea of this play. A man finds a tape of himself that he made years before as a youth. He listens to his young voice, his earlier ideas and ideals, and wonders about who that person is. His young self is a stranger to him now. Which makes me wonder, where is our identity? Time moves so quickly that as soon as we've grown comfortable with something, it's changed, and often before we've even realized it.

In short, who am I at this moment in time?