The BBC as “Commissioner” of Beckett’s Radio Plays

Abstract

This chapter nuances Martin Esslin’s claim that Beckett was never commissioned by the British Broadcasting Corporation (BBC). Not only did he allow himself to be engaged in an official sense at one point in his career, his own use of the term reflects a changing relationship with the BBC throughout the late 1950s, the early 1960s and the mid-1970s. Drawing on Beckett’s letters, notebooks and manuscripts, this chapter investigates the function of the BBC as “commissioner” of Beckett’s radio plays, supplementing Esslin’s insider’s account as a BBC employee and his selection of material from the Written Archives Centre (WAC). By relating the WAC to other archival materials, such as Beckett’s correspondence with Barbara Bray and the drafts of his radio plays, a more complex relationship between Beckett and the BBC emerges.