The latest publication in the Cambridge Elements series is Bad Godots: Vladimir Emerges from the Barrel and Other Interventions by veteran Beckett scholar S.E. Gontarski. According to its abstract, this volume ‘focuses on the machinery of commercial theatre, on extra-authorial interventions into the creative process and on the people and institutional forces that foster them. Such a process challenges the autonomy of the artwork and authorial integrity. The primary focus of this Element is then on the hybrid genre of theatre where collective esthetics tends to override and so to supersede individual creation. The essay pays special attention to Samuel Beckett’s first professionally produced play, Waiting for Godot, primarily its English language premieres in the
US, UK, and the Republic of Ireland. Its implications, however, reach far beyond the genetic and production histories of a single theatrical work to deal with the nature of authorship in a monetized culture, the process of realizing dramatic texts in such a culture, and Samuel Beckett’s engagement with such machinery of art’.
In keeping with its usual practice, this volume can be downloaded free of charge from 7 to 21 February 2024 at this link.
The Samuel Beckett Society 