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Hello, Samuel Beckett, 1906 to 1989,

lived in Paris and wrote his plays and novels in French.

Not because his French was better than his English,

but because it was worse.

In work such as Waiting for Godot, Endgame, Maloy,

and Malone dies, he wanted to show the limitations of language

what words could not do together with the absurdity

and humour of the human condition.

In part, he was reacting to the verbal omnipotence

of James Joyce, with whom he'd worked in Paris.

And in part, his experience in the French resistance

during World War II, when he used code writing,

not to reveal meaning, but to conceal it.

With me to discuss Samuel Beckett,

Steve Connor, Professor of English at the University of Cambridge,

Laura Solzbury, Professor of Modern Literature at the University of Exeter,

...