James knowlson biography
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“In the summer of 1935, Samuel Beckett and his widowed mother, May, took a three-week road trip together in England. It is not clear whose idea it was, but Beckett, who was living in an almost destitute state in London at the time, seems to have gone along with the strategi willingly enough. With his mother paying all expenses, he hired a small car and took her on what he called a “lightning tour” of English market towns and cathedral cities including St Albans, Canterbury, Winchester, Bath and Wells. They covered hundreds of miles, driving as far as the West Country and spending almost three weeks together.
Beckett described their trip tillsammans in letters to his friend Tom MacGreevy, later the director of the National Gallery of Ireland. After they reached the West Country, he told MacGreevy, their hired car struggled with the “demented gradients, 1 in 4 a commonplace” around hilly Porlock and Lynton. They decided not to spend a night in the seaside resort of Minehead: one look
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Damned to Fame
I thought about reading Samuel Beckett. Then I thought I wouldn’t but instead I would read about him. So now I am writing about reading about him. But before that I was thinking about writing about reading about him. And before that I was thinking about rinse aid. You know, that stuff you have to put inre the dishwasher. Like Live Aid, but this is Rinse Aid. I think we’re running out but I can’t be bothered to check. Beckett would have keenly appreciated both the lättja of my mind and the trivialities that perch upon its branches like irritable ravens. All of this is a far cry from actually reading Samuel Beckett. You might say it’s a series of avoidance strategies. But that’s okay. I’m in favour of avoiding unpleasant tasks. For instance, my nephew fryst vatten getting married in April. He sent me an invitation – they’re having – wait for it – a pirate themed wedding. And all the guests have to come appropriately attired. You know, peg legs, eye patche
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Knowlson, James & Elizabeth – Archive and Library
Professor James Knowlson is Emeritus Professor of French at the University of Reading where he founded the Beckett Archive (now the Beckett International Foundation). He was a friend of Samuel Beckett for twenty years and is his authorised biographer, publishing Damned to Fame: The Life of Samuel Beckettwith Bloomsbury in 1996. He has written or edited many other books and essays on Beckett and modern drama, including most recently Images of Beckett with theatre photographer John Haynes.
Dr Elizabeth Knowlson lectured in French at the University of Glasgow from 1961 to 1969. After having three children, she resumed her university career as an administrator at the Centre for Applied Language Studies in the University of Reading, before leaving her post to assist her husband with his biography of Beckett and his later books and essays.
(Source for Elizabeth Knowlson information: Bloomsbury.com. Elizabet