The End by Samuel Beckett (Type of Work)

 

The End

by Samuel Beckett

(Type of Work) 

Type of Work in The End by Samuel Beckett

Samuel Beckett’s The End is a short prose fiction that resists conventional literary classification. While it may be broadly described as a modernist or postmodern short story, its structure, themes, and narrative method place it firmly within the tradition of existential and absurdist literature. Rather than offering a plot-driven narrative, the work presents a fragmented account of a marginal figure moving toward physical and existential extinction. As such, The End functions less as a traditional story and more as a philosophical prose meditation on existence, decay, and cessation.

Formally, the work belongs to short fiction, but it deliberately subverts the expectations of the genre. There is no clear exposition, rising action, climax, or resolution. The narrative begins after the protagonist’s social life has already collapsed and proceeds through a series of disconnected episodes. This anti-plot structure reflects Beckett’s rejection of conventional storytelling and aligns the work with anti-narrative modernism, where meaning arises not from events but from the absence of meaningful progression.

In terms of literary movement, The End is best categorized as an existentialist and absurdist text. The narrator exists in a universe devoid of purpose, moral order, or transcendence. His expulsion from institutional care, repeated rejections, and final withdrawal from society underscore the absurd condition of human life as defined by Beckett: existence continues without justification, consolation, or hope. Unlike classical existentialist works that emphasize choice and freedom, Beckett’s vision minimizes agency, portraying the human subject as trapped in bodily decline and mental exhaustion.

The narrative technique further defines the type of work. The End employs a first-person, unreliable narrator whose perceptions are fragmented and often emotionally detached. Language is sparse, repetitive, and deliberately flat, reflecting the narrator’s psychological depletion. This minimalist style places the work within Beckett’s late-modernist prose, where language itself appears exhausted and inadequate to convey meaning.

Philosophically, the work functions as a prose analogue to Beckett’s dramatic works, particularly Waiting for Godot and Endgame. Like these plays, The End dramatizes stasis, waiting, and decline rather than action. The story can thus be seen as a thematic bridge between Beckett’s novels and his theater, sharing their bleak worldview while utilizing prose as its medium.

In conclusion, The End is best described as an existential absurdist short prose work with anti-narrative structure, combining modernist experimentation with philosophical inquiry. Its significance lies not in storytelling but in its relentless exploration of the final stages of human existence—life reduced to endurance, speech reduced to fragments, and narrative reduced to mere continuation until it can no longer go on.