Fitting the Prose to Radio: The Case of Lessness

Abstract

This chapter recreates the efforts necessary to adapt “Lessness” for radio and suggests that, rather than an “ideal text” for the medium as Martin Esslin claimed, the production of “Lessness” reveals the many tensions implicit in a change of medium, which Beckett may well have underestimated. Moreover, the history of the production and promotion of the radio “Lessness” gives an insight into how knowledge of Beckett’s creative process has framed subsequent critical reactions to this puzzling and elusive piece.