A thrilling stream of consciousness-like piece of drama that explores boundaries and dives into Beckett's style with some of his great dialogue and reveals.

4 stars. ( )

Not I was originally a play performed on stage where the only thing the audience saw was the mouth of a woman. The mouth then spills out a long stream of consciousness, while it struggles not to say I. The mouth stops talking at times as if it is listening to an inner voice unheard by the audience. The mouth tells the story of a woman who has experienced a traumatic event.

This would be an interesting text for a High School English class because It give a different perspective on storytelling. Its full of symbolism and allows students to develop their own ideas about what really is going on in the story.

Not I, written in English in 1972, features an actress seated on stage with just her mouth spot-lit. The mouth then delivers a long stream of consciousness. Evasion is the principle theme, as is highlighted by Beckett's note to the text in which the mouth's chief endeavour throughout the play is a 'vehement refusal to relinquish the third person'. The mouth undergoes a desperate struggle to avoid saying 'I', marked by four moments of crisis in which her monologue becomes a question and answer with an inner voice not heard by the audience.
[http://www.beckettonfilm.com/plays/noti/synopsis.html]