This article examines how the class Bivalvia of phylum Mollusca – mussels, oysters, clams and cockles – is represented and alluded to in Samuel Beckett’s texts and in the names of his characters. Beckett revives the erotic symbolism of the mollusc on both the narrative and the linguistic levels by giving many of his characters names starting with mol-, and by alluding to old ballads and playing with languages. The article pays particular attention to the character of Moll in Malone Dies, arguing that both her name and her interest in oysters link her to Molly Malone, the fishmonger of a Scottish song “In Dublin’s Fair City”, as well as to Oyster Moll, one of the most famous London prostitutes in the eighteenth century and the heroine of many nineteenth-century ballads. Further examples from Beckett’s novels and poems suggest that the image of the representatives of the phylum Mollusca – from a slow-moving clam to a sedentary feetless oyster – might have been inspired by James Joyce’s Ulysses and plays an important role in understanding Beckett’s concept of femininity, therefore deserving more consideration than it has previously received.