A New Approach to Watt

Because of the queer and irritating character of Watt — the man as well as the book — we may ask the same question as Mr Gorman does towards the end of that novel: ‘Who the devil are you … and what the hell do you want?’ 1 Beckett finished Watt immediately after the Second World War, and in Mercier et Carnier (1946), his first novel thereafter, written in French, he again refers to the difficulty of knowing Watt. The English translation reads: I am Watt, said Watt. As you say, I’m unrecognizable. Watt? said Camier. The name means nothing to me. I am not widely known, said Watt, but I shall be, one day. 2 Compared with the ‘utter ignorance’ registered at the beginning of the earlier novel, this statement implies that Watt can be known. These keywords were added by machine and not by the authors. This process is experimental and the keywords may be updated as the learning algorithm improves.