In a 2016 interview for BOMB Magazine, Lisa Dwan and Walter Asmus talk to Michael Coffey about their collaboration on Beckett’s late plays
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Samuel Beckett Died On This Day in 1989
An excerpt from Mel Gussow’s obituary, published in The New York Times, 27 December 1989:
“Samuel Beckett, a towering figure in drama and fiction who altered the course of contemporary theater, died in Paris on Friday at the age of 83. He died of respiratory problems in a Paris hospital, where he had been moved from a nursing home. He was buried yesterday at the Montparnasse cemetery after a private funeral.
Explaining the secrecy surrounding his illness, hospitalization and death, Irene Lindon, representing the author’s Paris publisher, Editions de Minuit, said it was ‘what he would have wanted.'”
Read MoreAn Animated Introduction to the Life and Work of Samuel Beckett
Professor Ronan McDonald has written a brief biography of the Nobel laureate for Alain de Botton’s School of Life series
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Michael Coffey on his book, Samuel Beckett Is Closed
“[A]ny attempt to get a handle on Beckett takes you to into interesting territory—to classical music, Irish history, Continental philosophy, World War II, abstract painting, the French language. For a quiet man his interests were voracious. Beckett scholarship has ranged far beyond those seminal early essays by Maurice Blanchot and Theodor Adorno and the studies by Ruby Cohn and Lawrence Harvey. Now, with James Knowlson’s authorized biography, the recently released four volumes of letters, and the digital manuscript project going on in Antwerp, the study of his works is vibrant all around the world.”
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Corresponding with Beckett
A London Beckett Seminar conference at the Institute of English Studies, School of Advanced Study, University of London, 1-2 June 2018
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Joyce to Beckett: Ireland & Modernism
A symposium at Magdalene College, Cambridge, in association with the Cambridge Group for Irish Studies. The distinguished line-up of speakers includes many of the leading figures in Irish studies across several generations, as well as creative writers and actors. While the main focus will be on the two greatest Irish modernist writers, Joyce and Beckett, contributors will also consider other modern Irish writers and the appropriateness or otherwise of “modernism” as a category in poetry, fiction, drama and the visual arts.
Read MoreLydia Davis on Samuel Beckett
Author Lydia Davis was drawn to the simplicity of Beckett’s work at an early age. From: Eat, Drink & Be Literary: Lydia Davis. Moderated by Deborah Treisman.
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New Beckett Research Centre in Reading to Inspire New Works
University of Reading: “Public events, new creative works, and funded fellowships around the work of Samuel Beckett will all be products of a new research centre dedicated to the Irish novelist, story writer, and playwright.
The Beckett Research Centre brings together academics at the University of Reading to promote world-leading research, teaching and creative projects based around the University’s internationally-recognised Beckett Archive.”
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The Hamish Canham (Applied) Prize – Free Prizegiving Presentation and Discussion
The free public event will take place in the 5th floor lecture theatre of The Tavistock Centre, London, on 13 December 2017. This year’s winner is Maryam Ghasemi, a former student of the Tavistock and Portman’s ‘Psychoanalytic Studies’ masters course. Her paper is titled, ‘Rockaby: Eros and Thanatos’, and is a psychoanalytic reading of the short play by Samuel Beckett.
Read MoreCFP: Samuel Beckett Working Group 2018
The conference theme of Theatre and Migration is intrinsically linked to questions of mobility and access, as it evokes various performances of borders. As a writer who moved from Ireland to France and wrote in multiple languages, Samuel Beckett’s works manifest the quest for transcending borders linguistically, culturally, artistically, philosophically and politically.
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The Samuel Beckett Society 