Molloy sucking stones

I took advantage of being at the seaside to lay in a store of
sucking-stones. They were pebbles but I call them stones. Yes, on
this occasion I laid in a considerable store. I distributed them
equally between my four pockets, and sucked them turn and turn
about. This raised a problem which I first solved in the following
way. I had say sixteen stones, four in each of my four pockets these
being the two pockets of my trousers and the two pockets of my
greatcoat. Taking a stone from the right pocket of my greatcoat, and
putting it in my mouth, I replaced it in the right pocket of my
greatcoat by a stone from the right pocket of my trousers, which I
replaced by a stone from the left pocket of my trousers, which I
replaced by a stone from the left pocket of my greatcoat, which I
replaced by the stone which was in my mouth, as soon as I had
finished sucking it. Thus there were still four stones in each of my
four pockets, but not quite the same stones.

And so on, and on. This is, of course, Beckett’s Molloy speaking, from theTrilogy. I’ve been doing a lot of geeky snooping around sites dealing with so-called Lifehacks, and rather marvellously, I noticed someone linking tothe stone-sucking sequencein ‘Molloy’, labelling it as a ‘lifehack’.

Let’s hope not, eh?

By the by, I always supposed that this sequence reflects Beckett’s cricketing youth (second time I’ve linked to that information). I imagine young S. Beckett standing in the field watching the umpire moving a stone from right pocket to left after each delivery, thinking “There’s got to be something in that.”