A comic novel written during the Second World War and published later. Watt, a odd and awkward man, travels to the house of a Mr Knott and becomes his servant. He tries to understand the puzzling routines of the household and the nature of his master, but logic keeps failing him.
The novel plays with lists, repeated permutations and absurd reasoning, showing a mind trying to make sense of a world that will not be explained. It is among Beckett's most playful and demanding books.
Quotes
God is a witness that cannot be sworn.
But he had turned, little by little, a disturbance into words, he had made a pillow of old words, for his head.
Bid us sigh on from day to day,And wish and wish the soul away,Till youth and genial years are flown,And all the life of life is gone.