Bananas

When Samuel Becket wrote “Krapp’s Last Tape” (1958), could he have picked any fruit other than the banana for Krapp to cram in his pocket? Were bananas a fave in Paris at the time? Did Beckett eat daily bananas? Surely at Somewhere U there’s a thesis on this. By the time of Krapp’s writing, WWII rations had ended in Europe, the new concern, regarding bananas, tariffs and costs. How much would one pay for a banana? What is it about the banana that inspires both commodious jokes and serious art as well as market speculation and spectacle?

Or all of the above. Reference the recent banana art installation that apparently sold at auction for $6.2 million. The banana is taped to the wall with duck tape. (Where’s Andy Warhol when you need him?) The duck taped to wall banana used the traditional gray colored duck tape. But duck tape now comes in various colors, and we would have picked a bright blue, which might suggest, mixing with the yellow, green, the color of money, which is what it’s all about, though at the same time, ok, it might say something about art, or art collecting, anyway.

The duck taped banana, titled “Comedian,” is acoustic, unlike the “electrical banana” in Donovan’s 1966 song titled “Mellow Yellow.” We won’t go into the suggestive meaning behind the banana electric, but it is easily looked up. In any case, an electric neon lit banana might have fetched even more than the $6.2 MM, with a wire dangling down to an outlet, perhaps requiring one or two additional strips of tape to secure it to the wall.

No telling what Beckett might have thought of all the current brouhaha over the banana. But “Krapp’s Last Tape” does contain both banana and tapes, at last count at least three bananas, all eaten, the peels discarded on the stage.

Speaking of bananas, below is a page from a draft sequel to “Scamble & Cramble: Two Hep Cats and Other Tall Tales.”