Communicating what Beckett said

WAITING FOR GODOT: The well-known Irish dramatist and novelist Samuel Beckett will be remembered with various creative communication programmes this year on his birth centenary.

Beckett is known for his best known play 'Waiting For Godot', which is produced in many parts of the world and is still being interpreted as the long wait for a change of the social system to a better plane of living.

Britain's Reading University in the latest issue of their alumni indicates the special items the Beckett Centenary has lined up in their program of work to mark this occasion.

The University has sometime ago had regarded Beckett as one of their close friends and one of the professors there. Professor James Knowlson happened to be a close associate and later the authorised biographer of Beckett.

Having only a handful of books at the time in the first instance, Knowlson had approached Beckett, who had offered a number of manuscripts and notebooks for the exhibition arranged in 1971 bearing the title Samuel Beckett Exhibition.

As the magazine indicates, this collection gradually expanded and Reading University happened to be the place, where the largest collection of Beckett items were stored originally intended as loans but later became gifts from Beckett which had now given way to the formation of a Beckett foundation which holds not only exhibitions but also seminars and conferences.

Although initially planned as a local close circuit exhibition, the display of exhibits was attracted with several items like group workshop cum seminars and discussions on Beckett's works.

It is also noted that one of Beckett's notebooks were auctioned recently at Southeby's with a reserve of 150,000 Sterling Pounds. As Reading's collection houses at least twenty similar notebooks it would easily be worth several million Pounds.

According to Professor Knowlson, working with Beckett's manuscripts everyday is a great privilege. They are according to him, much more than scraps of paper covered in what appears to be unintelligible scrawl.

Often written in several languages, for Beckett wrote both in French and English, they are virtual works of art themselves incorporating intricate doodles and sketches. All these had given way to the formation of an organisation called Beckett International Foundation.

The Foundation's archive houses over 600 letters, around 500 manuscripts and typed drafts, and notebooks in addition to annotated production texts and books from Beckett's own library including many signed editions.

'Stage files' document more than 700 international productions of Beckett's drama from all corners of the world.

There are over 1000 Beckett texts and similar number of critical works in more than 20 languages over 3000 articles collected from various parts of the world on Beckett.

There are 170 periodical titles and dissertations, audio and video recordings posters, photographs and paintings. It is reported that material is constantly being added to the collection both by donation and by purchase with new acquisitions being made available to researchers.

Almost immediately the foundation has served the international Beckett community for many years through its conferences, publications, and related events receiving around 350 researchers annually from the USA, Italy, Qatar, Australia and the UK.

Because of the nature and scope of the collection, it is not merely an academic centre of excellence but functions as a major literary and cultural resource, which is open to anyone with an interest in Beckett's life and work.

International theatre directors, actors, artists and composers all visit the collection. The organisers of the birth centenary activities note that the most significant factor is the discussions centred round Beckett works which is gradually expanding into other areas creating a better impact on creative activities like writing for the stage and film and other allied areas attempting to communicate what Beckett meant to say through his works both plays and the few novels like Malone Dies, Murphy and Unnameable.

Some of these works are recalled as significant contributions claiming a special identity for Beckett as a writer of an absurd form enveloping such themes as boredom, suffering, monotony and pessimism anticipating a happiness which is never received by humans.

Samuel Beckett was awarded the Nobel Prize for literature in 1969. He lived in France since 1938 and visited Ireland from time to time.