Krapp’s
As the younger Krapp explains on the tape, he is searching for the “grain” of his life, which he defines as “those things worth having when all the dust . . . when all my dust has settled.” Now, thirty years later, the aging and alcoholic Krapp does the same. However, he can only return to a prior tape, on which he recorded what his ledger describes as a “Farewell to love.” The voice on the tape goes on to state with youthful conviction that he would not want the years back, when he was capable of happiness. “Not with the fire in me now.” As the elder Krapp sits in the same room thirty years later, with the fire all but extinguished, he has only the darkness surrounding him. The room embodies the dismal reality of that future which compelled him to bid farewell to love.