The Letters of Samuel Beckett: Volume 2, 1941–1956 Hardcover – Illustrated, 29 Sept. 2011

Arrived speedily in excellent condition

This is one of the most amazing and wonderful works ever !

There are points in the letters which open up insights into Beckett's world that justify hours of hunting but there is also a lot of literary superfluity here.The question anyone has to ask is: whether someone were to publish Beckett's shopping list, or jobs to do at home list - would that be of interest, or value?There is a curious contradiction in our grasp of literature and the notion of authorship. From the extremity of denying the subject as author to the other extreme of reading a writer's life retrospectively through the great works they produce. Did Beckett know what he was producing? I think we have to be cautious here - you write out of necessity, of some compulsion that has its roots just out of sight. As a writer you try to reach in and grasp that root, to find what burns you, compels you to put pen to paper and articulate what seems worthless. But you do it anyway. Is there a clue in your outward life or do you write letters semi-consciously? Do you suspect that what you are writing has something more - possibly.This is the conundrum at the heart of these letters. Did Beckett know his place? Or did this acute awareness shadow these letters and make them semi-literary products in their own right?You decide.

It's a huge book so I shall be brief. A book for Beckett enthusiasts rather than general readers and continuing on from the well-received first volume, this collection of Beckett's letters covers the period that saw him achieve success with some of his most famous work including the classic play, Waiting for Godot. Beckett only allowed letters that directly related to his work to be published so those in search of something more intimate will be disappointed. But for those with a keen interest in the man and his work there will doubtless be plenty in here to satisfy as well as the pleasure that comes from having such an exhaustive reference on the shelf for years to come.

Beckett is a great writer but his letters are banal. A ponderous tome, of interest only to the odd scholar, not to admirers of the writer. Exhaustive and exhausting - pointlessly so.

This 800-odd page tome is doubtless of great interest to serious Beckett scholars, whether their particular interest is in the works or the man, but for the general reader it is somewhat disappointing. For one thing, as explained in the introduction Beckett specified that only letters relating to his work were to be published, and the Beckett estate has adopted a strict interpretation of this. As a result, only 40 per cent of the letters he wrote in this 15-year period (effectively a 10-year period because in the early 1940s he was working for the French resistance) were allowed to be published. And whereas I was hoping for lots of his critical ideas and opinions on literary and dramatic matters, what we get is much more in the nature of business matters concerning possible or actual productions of his work. Every letter he wrote in French is followed by an English translation, and there are copious notes by the editors about the various correspondents and others he mentions.This is not a book to read straight through from beginning to end. My method was to go through the index, looking up references to any person or subject which interested me. There is a 16-page General Introduction (i.e. to the whole 4-volume series), and a 30-page Introduction to Volume II, and to be honest I found this of more interest than most of the letters themselves. Quite by chance I spotted an error in one of the footnotes (page 587): the actor Peter Bull, who was in the original London production of Waiting for Godot, died in 1984, not 1955 as stated. One hopes there are not many other such errors.So, although as a general reader with only a passing interest in Beckett I found little to absorb me, in deference to genuine Beckett scholars I'm giving it a 3-star rating instead of something lower.

This is for those who are deeply intrested in the man and his life. I am not in that category. Most of it is basic mumbo jumbo to me. I am not disparaging SB or his life rather I'm showing my level of ineterest in him. I'll try and find the book a good home where it can be digested.