Beckett and Germany: Journal of Beckett Studies Volume 19, Number 2

Edited by Mark Nixon and Dirk van Hulle

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October, 2010
Paper, 128 pages,
ISBN: 978-0-7486-4139-0
Edinburgh University Press
$30.00

German culture intensely influenced the work of Samuel Beckett. This book assesses the author's relationship with German literature, art, and philosophy and recounts the country's reception of his work. A lover of German literature and aspiring art critic, Beckett traveled across Germany during an extremely tumultuous and dangerous time. This volume presents a complete chronology of this journey, which lasted from 1936 to 1937, and describes Beckett's attitudes toward German Romanticism from both a literary and philosophical perspective. As to the German reception of Beckett's work, Theodor W. Adorno's Versuch, das Endspiel zu verstehen played a central role. This volume translates and interprets Adorno's notes on Fin de partie and L'Innommable, which comments on the direction of Beckett's Endspiel and his relationship with the television and radio station Süddeutscher Rundfunk (SDR). In conclusion, the collection offers a review of recent German publications on Beckett.

About the Author

Mark Nixon is lecturer in twentieth-century English literature, School of English and American Literature, University of Reading, and Dirk van Hulle is associate professor of literature in English at the University of Antwerp.

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