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Chapter 4 - Samuel Beckett

Published online by Cambridge University Press:  05 November 2015

Michael Y. Bennett
Affiliation:
University of Wisconsin, Whitewater
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Summary

Samuel Barclay Beckett (1906–89) was born in the Dublin suburb of Foxrock, Ireland. Son of middle-class Protestant parents, Beckett attended Portora Royal School (where Oscar Wilde also went) and then Trinity College Dublin. After graduating, Beckett took lecturer posts at École Normale Supérieure and then back at Trinity College Dublin. Giving up his career in academia, and after being a part of the French Resistance in WWII, Beckett spent most of his adult life in Paris writing plays, short stories, novels, essays, and poetry. Best known for his play, Waiting for Godot, Beckett won the Nobel Prize in Literature in 1969. Samuel Beckett died in 1989.

One of the primary challenges in discussing a writer in relation to the absurd, as mentioned earlier, is that these writers associated with the absurd were not a part of a self-proclaimed movement; rather, the “movement” was thrust upon them as a somewhat after-the-fact categorization. The analysis of Samuel Beckett's work maybe most clearly typifies this conundrum for both the scholar and the student. Samuel Beckett is one of the most written about authors of the twentieth century. And while Beckett has been the poster boy of absurdism, and in some ways defines how the general public and academics alike understand absurdism, it must be stressed (and this cannot be overstated) that Beckett should not be (and is not) understood only through the lens of the absurd. The absurd is a catchall concept that functions almost as mental shorthand for connecting writers who, while doing some similar things, are also each creating their own literary paths. Therefore, it is vital to understand how Beckett does not just fit in with other absurdists, but transcends and departs from them. As such, it is worth noting that Beckett studies, especially in the last number of decades, has followed its own leads, not defaulting to Beckett as an absurdist to make sense of his work.

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Publisher: Cambridge University Press
Print publication year: 2015

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  • Samuel Beckett
  • Michael Y. Bennett, University of Wisconsin, Whitewater
  • Book: The Cambridge Introduction to Theatre and Literature of the Absurd
  • Online publication: 05 November 2015
  • Chapter DOI: https://doi.org/10.1017/CBO9781107284265.004
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  • Samuel Beckett
  • Michael Y. Bennett, University of Wisconsin, Whitewater
  • Book: The Cambridge Introduction to Theatre and Literature of the Absurd
  • Online publication: 05 November 2015
  • Chapter DOI: https://doi.org/10.1017/CBO9781107284265.004
Available formats
×

Save book to Google Drive

To save content items to your account, please confirm that you agree to abide by our usage policies. If this is the first time you use this feature, you will be asked to authorise Cambridge Core to connect with your account. Find out more about saving content to Google Drive.

  • Samuel Beckett
  • Michael Y. Bennett, University of Wisconsin, Whitewater
  • Book: The Cambridge Introduction to Theatre and Literature of the Absurd
  • Online publication: 05 November 2015
  • Chapter DOI: https://doi.org/10.1017/CBO9781107284265.004
Available formats
×