Squaring the Circle: The Geometry of Lars Norén and Samuel Beckett’s Plays

To examine the extent and consistency of the influence of Samuel Beckett on Swedish playwright Lars Norén, the present essay describes their form literally, in geometric terms. Like Beckett, Norén insists on negativity and incompletion; both writers replace development and resolution with repetition and stasis, here referred to as circles and squares. A combination of the two is particularly present in Norén’s work, which gives it a paradoxical geometry. The circular square is an image of infinite, unresolved conflict. Repetition of stasis is an impossible condition for the narrative arts, embodied in this figure. At the same time, the circle and square texts offer a certain resistance to their own formal condition, in the act of beginning and ending at all.