About Samuel Beckett
Samuel Barclay Beckett was an Irish playwright, poet, novelist, and literary critic. Writing in both English and French, his literary and theatrical works feature bleak, impersonal, and tragicomic episodes of life, coupled with black comedy and literary nonsense. Beckett is widely regarded as one of the most influential and important writers of the 20th century, credited with transforming modern theatre. As a major figure of Irish literature, he is best known for his tragicomedy play Waiting for Godot (1953). For his foundational contribution to both literature and theatre, Beckett received the 1969 Nobel Prize in Literature, "for his writing, which—in new forms for the novel and drama—in the destitution of modern man acquires its elevation." During the Second World War, Beckett became a member of the French Resistance group Gloria SMH (Réseau Gloria) and was awarded the Croix de Guerre in 1949. Beckett's works are known for their existential themes, and these made them an important part of 20th-century plays and dramas. He wrote his first novel Dream of Fair to Middling Women in 1932, which influenced many of his later works, but it was not published until after his death.
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