Seeing into Nothingness -- this is the true seeing, the eternal
　　　　  seeing.
　　　　  -- Shen-Hui
　　　　  When, after the approximately ten minutes of static, nearly
　　　　  motionless monologue which comprises Ohio Impromptu,(1) we hear R
　　　　  pronounce "Nothing is left to tell," it is quite apparent that in
　　　　  this, one of Samuel Beckett's last plays, the author has taken yet
　　　　  another step toward the zero point of "lessness" (to use his own
　　　　  term) to which he had been striving in his late works.(2) In
　　　　  previous plays like Footfalls, we can see a "winding down" of motion
　　　　  and interaction as May and V begin with dialogue and fairly
　　　　  consistent movement, only to (d)evolve into monologue, then silence
　　　　  and stillness in the final blank tableau. In Ohio Impromptu,
　　　　  however, the play as a totality apparently eliminates nearly all
　　　　  motion and interaction between characters. Two characters, owning
　　　　  only the titles L and R, simply sit, R reading a story from a "worn
　　　　  volume" of two other, implicitly related characters who eventually
　　　　  sit and read from a 11 worn volume" themselves. In this quiet,
　　　　  "Noh-like" play,(3) the only motion and interaction we see for most
　　　　  of the play are L's knocks on the table at which they sit, which
　　　　  cause R to repeat the last sentence from the book he reads.
　　　　  We seem far here from the easier comprehensibility of Beckett's
　　　　  earlier, more physically active and representational plays like
　　　　  Waiting for Godot, yet Ohio Impromptu's internal narrative and
　　　　  physical representation are each remarkably straightforward (akin to
　　　　  the immediate context of, say, Catastrophe). We hear a story of a
　　　　  man who tries, but fails, to escape the memory of his lost love by
　　　　  moving to what seems fairly obviously to be the right bank of the
　　　　  Seine river in Paris;(4) after a time, he is successfully comforted
　　　　  by one sent from his Beloved, who comes to him at night and reads
　　　　  him a narrative from a "worn volume." We see two men sitting at a
　　　　  "white deal table" with a "Black wide-brimmed hat" resting at its
　　　　  center, R reading from a book, L apparently listening (285). Why
　　　　  then the frustrating strangeness of the play? Quite simply because
　　　　  of slippage: slippage between what we see on stage and what we hear
　　　　  in R's narrative, slippage between the categories "play" and
　　　　  "fiction," slippage between past and future, and so on.
　　　　  Language, for example, slips between the expected (or read) and
　　　　  unexpected (or spontaneous): once, on reading the odd,