Professor David Peimer
Samuel Beckett’s Life and Plays
Summary
Samuel Beckett (1906–1989) was an Irish playwright and Nobel Prize winner during the middle of the 20th Century. Focusing on his life, sense of humor, and the play “Waiting for Godot” (1953), this lecture also touches on Beckett’s post-World War II approach to theater, his influence on global writers, and his departure from James Joyce’s influence. The concept of tragicomedy in “Waiting for Godot” is also explored, highlighting the absurd indifference of life and the importance of choosing a purpose.
Professor David Peimer
David Peimer is a professor of theatre and performance studies in the UK. He has taught at the University of the Witwatersrand, Johannesburg, and New York University (Global Division), and was a Fulbright Scholar at Columbia University. Born in South Africa, David has won numerous awards for playwriting and directing. He has written eleven plays and directed forty in places like South Africa, New York, Brussels, London, Berlin, Zulu Kingdom, Athens, and more. His writing has been published widely and he is the editor of Armed Response: Plays from South Africa (2009) and the interactive digital book Theatre in the Camps (2012). He is on the board of the Pinter Centre in London.
It was all part of the Camus, Sartre world in the thirties, in particular, the influence of Camus and later.
Yes, he wouldn’t allow that Godot specifically to be made into a film. He wanted it to be kept metaphor and image, so never, the set could not be naturalistic and set in an obvious rubbish dump somewhere in a very poverty stricken area of whatever country. He never wanted to be literal or naturalistic.
Yes. After the war, he started writing everything in French and then he would translate it all back into English, because he said writing in French helped him be absolutely minimalist with the number of words.