Samuel Barclay Beckett (1906–89) was an Irish playwright, novelist, and poet who wrote in both English and French. He was a permanent resident of France from the mid-1930s. He was awarded the 1969 Nobel Prize in Literature.
Beckett is best known for his three full-length plays, Waiting for Godot (1952,) Krapp’s Last Tape (1959,) and Play (1964.) These novels express Beckett’s bleak view of the stagnation and futility of suffering, paralysis, and endurance in the face of man’s inevitable death and oblivion.
Beckett’s work is associated with existentialism and the theater of the absurd—characterized by repetitive, inventive language, and a fixation on futility and meaninglessness. The literary effect is a remarkable series of challenges to the readers’ conception of the world and their capacity to accept the full implications of the mysteries of existence.
More: Wikipedia • READ: Works by Samuel Beckett
Ever tried? Ever failed? No matter. Try again. Fail again. Fail better.
—Samuel Beckett
Topics: Failure
To think, when one is no longer young, when one is not yet old, that one is no longer young, that one is not yet old, that is perhaps something.
—Samuel Beckett
Topics: Age, Aging
Nothing is funnier than unhappiness, I grant you that. Yes, yes, it’s the most comical thing in the world.
—Samuel Beckett
Topics: Unhappiness
The tears of the world are a constant quality. For each one who begins to weep, somewhere else another stops. The same is true of the laugh.
—Samuel Beckett
Topics: Crying, Cries
We are not saints, but we have kept our appointment. How many people can boast as much?
—Samuel Beckett
Topics: Punctuality
We are all born crazy. Some remain that way.
—Samuel Beckett
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