Bisected to commit c94c492 / #10699, /cc @dcbaker

As an example test case, see https://github.com/linuxmint/xreader/ which builds a static library builddir/cut-n-paste/totem-screensaver/libtotemscrsaver.a that is linked into shell/libshell.a which is in turn linked into shell/xreader.

libtotemscrsaver has a dependency('x11') and uses its symbols; no other code uses it directly. With the latest release of Meson, everything works. With the release candidate, a number of libraries are no longer linked to, such as /usr/lib/libX11.so.