Krapp's Last Tape
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Krapp's Last Tape is a play by Samuel Beckett. It deals with technology as a means of creating narrative and story, and reacting to history.
Krapp, an aging man (with a fondness for bananas), finds a tape, "box three, spool five", in which the voice of his younger self recounts details about his life at that time.
Krapp is dissatisfied with his younger self on listening: he feels he was pompous and had misaligned priorities — Krapp listens particularly to his younger self recounting his past loves (and perhaps sexual encounters, but this is not explicitly stated), especially with one woman, once on a barge.
Krapp finally records a reel in which he reflects on the experience of listening to his younger self – "Just been listening to that stupid bastard I took myself for thirty years ago" – before wrenching it off the recorder.
Other uses
Krapp's Last Tape is also the title of the twelfth or fourteenth track (depending on the version) on Sol Niger Within, the first and, to date, only solo release by Meshuggah guitarist Frederik Thordendal's side project, Special Defects.
External links
- Text of the Play (http://www.msu.edu/user/sullivan/BeckettKrapp.html)