The Role of Absurdity in Waiting for Godot

Abstract

Samuel Beckett (April 13, 1906–December 22, 1989) was an Irish avant-garde playwright, poet and novelist best known for his play Waiting for Godot. Strongly influenced by fellow Irish writer, James Joyce, Beckett is sometimes considered the last of the Modernists; however, as his body of work influenced many subsequent writers, he is also considered one of the fathers of the post-modernist movement. He was awarded the Nobel Prize for Literature in 1969, for his writing, which-in new forms for the novel and drama-in the destitution of modern man acquires its elevation. Born in the Dublin suburb of Foxrock on Good Friday, 1906, Samuel Barclay Beckett was the younger of two sons born to William Frank Beckett and May Barclay. The area surrounding his family home featured in his prose and poetry later in life. Irish poet and Beckett biographer, Anthony Cronin said of Samuel Beckett's childhood, “if anything, an outdoor type rather than an indoor one. He enjoyed games and was good at them”, (Beckett, 1976).