Queer Relations or the "incoercible Absence of Relation" in Beckett's and the Post-War Prose

This article investigates Peter Boxall's contention that a regard for the queer erotics of Beckett's prose opens up the possibilities of new forms of relation in the works. Drawing on the queer theories of Leo Bersani and on Beckett's thinking concerning relation as expressed in the Three Dialogues and his correspondence, it is argued that any form of relation is shadowed by the threat of coercion and violence, thus raising an ethical issue of the desirability of relation at such a cost.