The Complete Short Prose of Samuel Beckett, 1929-1989 [Paperback]

Samuel Beckett (Author), S. E. Gontarski (Editor)

Book Description

Publication Date: March 13, 1997

Nobel Prize winner Samuel Beckett was one of the most profoundly original writers of the 20th century. He gave expression to the anguish and isolation of the individual consciousness with a purity and minimalism that have altered the shape of world literature. A tremendously influential poet and dramatist, Beckett spoke of his prose fiction as the "important writing," the medium in which he distilled his ideas most powerfully. Here, for the first time, his short prose is gathered in a definitive, complete volume by leading Beckett scholar S. E. Gontarski.

Editorial Reviews

Amazon.com Review

Although Samuel Beckett (1906-1989) is best-known for his novels, such as the Molloy series, and his still frequently-performed plays like Waiting for Godot and Endgame, he is rarely thought of as a writer of short fiction and prose. Yet he wrote short works devotedly throughout his life; many critics count various Beckett short stories as masterpieces of the form, central to an appreciation of the writer's oeuvre. The Complete Short Prose, 1929-1989, as the title suggests, collects all of the Nobel Prize-winner's shorter works, such as "First Love," and "The Lost Ones."

Product Details

• Paperback: 336 pages
• Publisher: Grove Press; 1st Paperback edition (March 13, 1997)
• Language: English
• ISBN-10: 0802134904
• ISBN-13: 978-0802134905
• Product Dimensions: 8.3 x 5.5 x 0.9 inches
• Shipping Weight: 13.3 ounces (View shipping rates and policies)
• Average Customer Review: 3.7 out of 5 stars  See all reviews (7 customer reviews)
• Amazon Best Sellers Rank: #238,759 in Books (See Top 100 in Books)

Customer Reviews

Most Helpful Customer Reviews

17 of 18 people found the following review helpful:

5.0 out of 5 stars Beckett's little-known nonfiction, September 22, 1999

By A Customer

This review is from: The Complete Short Prose of Samuel Beckett, 1929-1989 (Paperback)

While Beckett's works certainly contain their share of angst, there is more to his work than that, as this collection reminds us. The last work in this collection is a nonfiction essay that Beckett wrote for Irish radio just after World War II called "The Capital of the Ruins." Beckett's subject was a field hospital in the French town of St. Lo that Irish citizens had helped to staff (and where he himself had worked as an interpreter). While the prose is unmistakably Beckett (particularly the self-deprecating humor--at one point he refers to the essay as a "circumlocution"), the optimism of trying to convince his people that they had helped their fellow human beings survive a terrible war more easily is not what we expect from him. Also typical is a wonderful Biblical allusion to the Book of Isaiah and its great swords-and-plowshares metaphor, which he cleverly adapts to modern times. There is a lot of wonderful fiction in this volume (my favorite is "The Cliff," a short meditation, possibly on a preserved skull), but the non-fiction is not to be neglected, and reveals a side of this writer not often seen or considered.

21 of 24 people found the following review helpful:

5.0 out of 5 stars Beckett: Still Relevant, April 19, 2004

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alexander laurence (Los Angeles, CA) - See all my reviews

This review is from: The Complete Short Prose of Samuel Beckett, 1929-1989 (Paperback)

The Complete Short Prose 1929-1989 is one of the great books to appear in the last ten years. I grew up reading parts in anthology and thin Grove Press editions. At last many of these sparse texts parading around as novels have come together under one cover. Stories like "First Love" and "The End" are among Beckett's strongest works, and "Texts for Nothing" are extremely complex and perhaps the most moving monolgues I know, for they often bring tears to my eyes. Beautiful stuff! You need some sort of literary standard other than Dave Eggers or Cormac McCarthy: I'll take Beckett any day!

Beckett had a big influence on European writing, but his influence is almost invisible on American letters. Sometimes you hear about writers being influenced by Kundera, Borges, or Kafka, but Beckett has eluded the art of writing here, with the exception of play writing. That's unfortunate, because his trilogy of novels and much of his short texts are some of the most intense, beautiful writing in the past half-century. Edward Dahlberg often talked about this sort of great writing: "It was to take me many years to realize that one has to be very lucky to write one intelligence sentence."

After reading the definitive introduction by the writer S. E. Gontarski, I am convinced that Beckett is the creator of "Spoken Word." Take that to the bank! In works such as "Fizzles" and "The Lost Ones" Beckett modulates a disembodied voice that is stripped away of all mimesis, yet it is the same interior voice that permeates all his fiction. Haunting, profound, chilling. I can think of no equal to Beckett's prose writing, except maybe Dahlberg himself. Only if today's hack writing was half as good as Beckett and Dahlberg....

People should read The Complete Short Prose and Three Novels like they read the Bible. Do it now! I know why these books are worth reading! As Dahlberg once said, "What need had I of the sour pedants of humid syntax, or of courses in pedagogy, canonized illiteracy. I saw that anybody who had read twelve good books knew more than a doctor of philosophy." Nevermind these fads, these 20 under 40, and so on. Nevermind.

13 of 14 people found the following review helpful:

5.0 out of 5 stars The forgotten master of short prose, March 22, 1998

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[e-mail] (white plains,ny) - See all my reviews

This review is from: The Complete Short Prose of Samuel Beckett, 1929-1989 (Paperback)

Essential for anyone interested in 20th century prose. Complements the holes in language the novels & plays sought to expose. Beckett knew everything there is to know about form. These shorts move between poetry and prose. See especially the series "First Love", "The Expelled", "The Calmative", "The End"- the bridge from Watt to Molloy. The blackened page of Beckett's paragraph-less mummur is not for everyone, but once you hear his rhythm, it is not easily forgotten.