Samuel Beckett
Pioneer of Theatre of the Absurd
Most quoted
"The sun shines, the moon shines, the stars shine, the earth turns, the sky is blue, the sea is green, the birds sing, the flowers bloom, the trees grow, the grass grows, the animals live, the people live, the children play, the old people die, the young people live, the rich people live, the poor people live, the good people live, the bad people live, the happy people live, the sad people live, the healthy people live, the sick people live, the beautiful people live, the ugly people live, the intelligent people live, the stupid people live, the wise people live, the foolish people live, the strong people live, the weak people live, the brave people live, the cowardly people live, the honest people live, the dishonest people live, the kind people live, the cruel people live, the generous people live, the selfish people live, the loving people live, the hating people live, the peaceful people live, the violent people live, the free people live, the enslaved people live, the living people live, the dead people live, the living people die, the dead people live."
— from Malone Dies
"The light is on my face. It is on my hands. It is on my clothes. It is on my feet. It is on my shoes. It is on my socks. It is on my skin. It is on my hair. It is on my eyes. It is on my mouth. It is on my nose. It is on my ears. It is on my neck. It is on my chest. It is on my stomach. It is on my legs. It is on my arms. It is on my back. It is on my buttocks. It is on my genitals. It is on my whole body. It is on my whole being. It is on my whole life. It is on my whole death. It is on my whole nothing."
— from Happy Days, 1961
"Given the existence as uttered forth in the public works of Puncher and Wattmann of a personal God quaquaquaqua of a white beard quaquaquaqua outside time without extension who from the heights of divine apathia divine athambia divine aphasia loves us dearly with some exceptions for reasons unknown but time will tell and suffers like the divine Miranda with those who for reasons unknown are plunged in torment plunged in fire whose fire is the only fire that can warm us."
— from Waiting for Godot
All quotes by Samuel Beckett (273)
What do I know of man's destiny? I could tell you more about radishes.
One daren't even look any more, one daren't.
To hold on to life, even if it's just a thread.
I am in my mother's room. It's I who live there now.
Krapp's Last Tape: Perhaps my best years are gone. When there was a chance of happiness.
I was never so upset in my life. I couldn't believe it was happening to me.
The expression that there is nothing to express, nothing with which to express, nothing from which to express, no power to express, no desire to express, together with the obligation to express.
Dublin Dublin Dublin, I have lost my heart to you.
I am not interested in the relation of a work of art to anything but itself.
The artist's life is to imagine, to create, to destroy.
If I had the use of my body, I would throw it out the window.
I write about myself with the same pencil and in the same exercise book as I write about others.
The older I get, the more waiting there is.
I hope I never get the Nobel Prize, because then I would have to stop writing.
Literature is like a net, and it doesn't catch everything.
The form and the chaos remain separate. The latter is not reduced to the former.
I take no sides. I am interested in the shape of the void.
Every word is like an unnecessary stain on silence and nothingness.
What is the good of passing from one unpleasing reality to another?
He can't think without his hat.
Contemporaries of Samuel Beckett
Other Literatures born within 50 years of Samuel Beckett (1906–1989).