Bio of Playwright Samuel Beckett

This Irish writer and playwright was born in Dublin in 1906.His father, William Beckett Jr., was a surveyor.Mary Roe Beckett, his mother, was a nurse before she was married.Samuel Beckett attended Portora Royal School, followed by Trinity College in Dublin.He received his bachelor’s degree in 1927, majoring in French and Italian.He was hired as a school teacher in Belfast, lecturing in English at the Ecole Normale Superieure in Paris.

In 1931, Beckett returned to Dublin and received his master’s degree in 1932.He was a French teacher at Trinity College in Dublin where he chose to end his career as a teacher and solely pursue a career as a writer.

His first poem, named “Whoroscope” was written in 1930, followed be a group of essays called “Proust“.His first novel “More Pricks Than Kicks” was published in 1934.During this time while he was residing in London, he was hospitalized for a stab wound he received from a pimp whom he refused to pay.

During his stay in London, he met Suzanna Dechevaux-Dumesnul and they married in 1961.She was shocked when he was given the Nobel Prize and refused to go to the ceremony.

At the start of World War II, he was in Ireland.He went to Paris and joined a resistance group.He was forced to go to southern France with his wife to hide from the Nazis.During this time, he worked as a laborer and wrote “Watt“, his second novel, also the last one written originally in English.

In 1949, Beckett wrote his first theatre script, “En Attendant Godot“.He also did writing for radio, theatre, and television.After his wife died in 1989, he lived in a nursing home until December 22, 1989 when he died of respiratory problems.