Samuel Beckett

[Stewart]

I think we should have a thread on Samuel Beckett, if only because he's been on my mind recently. Plus, he wrote in French and translated his works into English, so it makes sense that he deserves a seat at the WLF table.

I've never read him or, more accurately, I have a memory of starting Waiting For Godot when I was younger and not really getting it at all, and discarding it. But now, having obtained myself the four volumes of the Grove Centenery edition of his (almost) complete works, I now feel a need to read something by him.

And that's where the forum comes in handy. How would one recommend I read Beckett? The novels first? Or the plays? In chronological order regardless, or some semblance of thematic order? Really, where to start?

 

[Daniel del Real]

Unbeliveable there was no Beckett's thread before.

I am a huge fan, not only his plays but his novels.
I started with Waiting for Godot at college, a mandatory read. I quite liked because I was able to get the whole absurd situation in his universe. We also read at the same time Ionesco and Mihura which helped a lot to understand it.
Later I started reading the trilogy. Started with Molloy which I think is his best. Then everything starts complicating with Malone Dies and then The Unnamable, it's a very difficult to understand monologue.
However this trilogy takes you to an universe of decadence where there is no hope at all. Everything turns more strange as you advance and at the end you are caught into a whirl of ideas and a nihilistic atmosphere.
Still you gotta have patience if you want to try Beckett, is not an easy author to read, but trust me, patience will retrieve you with an amazing writer.

 

[Daniel del Real]

By the way, I'm trying to find Murphy, they say it's quite good too.

 

[Mirabell]

Really, where to start?

Start with the Trilogy, it will introduce you to his way with humor, his relationship to words and death. After finishing it you can go on the plays (chronologically) and the short prose (in a pretty volume at GRove).

 

[Liam]

I have a memory of starting Waiting For Godot when I was younger and not really getting it at all, and discarding it.

Waiting for Godot is my favorite 20th-century play... Stewart!

I second Daniel and Mirabell's recommendation(s). The Trilogy is amazing.

 

[Stewart]

Waiting for Godot is my favorite 20th-century play... Stewart!

Hey, I was about fourteen and devouring horror novels at the time.

 

[promtbr]

Waiting for Godot is my favorite 20th-century play... Stewart!

Mine as well. When I "abandoned" reading all lit for 25 years, I would occasionally still re-read WFG for sustenance...my copy is barely held together.

I have not read the Trilogy. Murphy was amazing and seemed a decent entry point, tho its evident he was still under Joyce's influence in this. IMHO, do NOT start with Watt.

I will let the Beckett heavyweights suggest the secondary lit. spoool has led me to Ricks and Badiou and tho unread, the Ricks looks juicy.

Can't recommend the Knowlson Bio, Damned To Fame highly enough, Sam led a very interesting and eventlful life...

 

[ferns_dad]

Watt is a really good one, very humorous

 

[mansaturday]

Ah yes, now we're a little more certain which thread we're with, I have to say that my favorite Beckett (and I far prefer his plays) is Endgame rather than Godot - you can play about with it more, see more mind and body analogies, generally mess with it intellectually. Of the later plays, which obviously involve a minimalizing of everything, Not I takes it for me, with its mouth not eye dominating the whole performance. Love it.

 

[Ramblingsid]

Oh "Waiting for Godot"!! Fabuloso!! Greatstuff!! Glorious!! I think it was on my list of fifty if I remember aright.

I have never seen the play performed - sadly, and as yet - but I devoured loads of Becket's writings in my twenties (longer ago than I care to remember) and have re-read it many many times.

About that time discovered a lot of drama - Trevor Griffiths in particular if I remember correctly.

Endgame, Krapp's last tape, etc etc

Wonderful stuff! Funny. Bleak. With searing flashes of humanity. Extraordinary!!

Can you tell I like him?

 

[David J]

Krapp's Last Tape is another Beckett play. Powerful stuff.

I would also recommend Molloy, the first book of the Malone trilogy, as it shows the funny, humourous side to his writing.

As for secondary reading, the biography, Damned to Fame, by James Knowlson is good.

 

[rabbitfast]

I kept waiting for this thread but it wasn't coming...and so I thought about starting it myself but then...I was sure it would come.

I started with Godot...Then came Endgame (both in college). I absolutely loved Murphy. Unfortunately, that's all I've read thus far. Krapp's Last Tape is firmly planted on my shelf and awaiting its turn...I was going to attempt that other Irishman's little book...Finnegans Wake

What is it about the Irish, eh?

 

[Backwords]

I've read all of his plays and shorter works although not all the novels. My recommendation is The Unnamable which I claim is his single most outstanding work. Why not dive right in the deep end, like they say, life is short and the best is not too good?

 

[beelzebubbles]

Beckett makes me want to lie catatonic in a gutter and think of musical notation.

Though I will go see Waiting for Godot if anyone wants to take me.

 

[ferns_dad]

the trio of M, MD and the Un

and Watt, also

 

[Jayaprakash]

I recently read MERCIER AND CAMIER and liked it a lot. I've read WFG of course, and found it both disconcerting and hilarious. I've got to read more! I keep putting it off because I claim to myself that I don't read plays, but now lots of his novels are freely available too.

 

[vijayalphonse]

Hi,

Since the people on this thread are serious Beckettians, thought I'd share that Happy Days is scheduled to be played by Patty Gallagher (who is legendary for playing this role in the US and many other parts of the world).

Dec 12, 13, 2009, Rangashankara. More details are available at www.ligra.in

Cheers
Vijay

 

[Manuel76]

One of my very favorite writers too: I read second and third part of his trilogy (Malone dies and The Unnamable) and are among my favorite novels. I read them in french (unlike his theatre which I've only read in english) but was thinking about reading them again in his own english translation. Anybody knows if there's any important difference?.

I love all his theatre too: Waiting for Godot, Happy Days (my favorite), but Krapp's Last Tape too and his shorter pieces (most of them very interesting too). I only remember having been dissapointed by Endgame, and it was a long time ago (perhaps should try it again).

 

[Backwords]

I've been reading the first part of his collected letters. He's complaining about how tedious the writing of Murphy was, how bored he was with the work. There is allot of playfulness with language. Interesting from the point of view of "writing craft" or "the writers life" or whatever. I want to see what he has to say about the latter, better works... in the coming volumes.

 

[Backwords]

Can we have some specific passages (quotes from the text) to illustrate the stuff that has engendered (so to speak) this bleak response. Me would be interested to see. :O

_____

A side and untranslatable rant :

Recalled to my mind is what "the man in the glass booth" said about hieronymus bosch - that his paintings are not fantastical but pure documentary realism. And I have read that in practice the Theater of the Absurd, in performance, gives the impression of naturalism.