Rough for Theatre I (Fragment de théâtre I, written c. late 1950s, published 1979) by Samuel Beckett (Key Facts)

 

Rough for Theatre I (Fragment de théâtre I, written c. late 1950s, published 1979)

by Samuel Beckett

(Key Facts) 

Key Facts — Rough for Theatre I by Samuel Beckett

 

Full Title

Rough for Theatre I (French: Fragment de théâtre I)

 

Author

Samuel Beckett

 

Type of Work

Dramatic fragment / short experimental play

 

Genre

Absurdist drama; late-modernist minimalist theatre; anti-theatre

 

Language

Originally written in French; later translated into English by Samuel Beckett

 

Time and Place Written

Late 1950s; written primarily in Paris, France

 

Date of First Publication

1979 (posthumous publication)

 

Publisher

Les Éditions de Minuit (French); later English editions by Faber & Faber / Grove Press in collected plays

 

Tone

Bleak, austere, ironic, existential, restrained

 

Setting (Time)

Indeterminate; outside historical or chronological time (a perpetual present)

 

Setting (Place)

An undefined, empty theatrical space with no identifiable features

 

Protagonist

A (in relational terms, A and B together function as a dual or composite protagonist)

 

Major Conflict

The desire for movement and progress versus physical immobility and mutual dependence

 

Rising Action

A repeatedly urges movement; B delays or resists cooperation, intensifying frustration and exposing dependence

 

Climax

The attempted movement itself—when cooperation briefly occurs but reveals the futility and meaninglessness of progress

 

Falling Action

Fatigue, cessation of effort, and a return to stasis

 

Resolution

None; the fragment ends without closure, mirroring the unresolved condition of existence

 

Themes

Human interdependence as entrapment

Illusion of autonomy and agency

Movement versus immobility

Power through passivity

Futility of action

Existence as endurance rather than achievement

Incompleteness and fragmentation

 

Motifs

Attempted and aborted movement

Delay and hesitation

Repetition of speech and action

Silence versus speech

Physical limitation

 

Symbols

The crippled body: existential limitation

The wheelchair: conditional, dependent mobility

The stick: artificial support and fragile balance

The empty stage: existential void

Fragmentary structure: incompleteness of being

 

Foreshadowing

The repeated failure and hesitation surrounding movement foreshadow the inevitable return to stasis and the absence of resolution; early delays anticipate the play’s final immobility and abrupt ending.