Samuel Beckett and Ecology - by Trish McTighe & Céline Thobois-Gupta & Nicholas E Johnson (Hardcover)

About the Book

"Beckett and Ecology is the first full-length book to offer a wide range of scholarly and artistic responses to the ecological crises provoked, mediated, or challenged by Beckett's work. The volume reflects on the varied practices and narratives in Beckettian intermedial ecologies, offering new insights into the connections between Beckett and the Anthropocene in the terrains of translation, adaptation, performance and the visual arts. Chapters also explore the potential of Happy Days (1961) for ecological thought, and the role it has taken in ecodramaturgy"--

Book Synopsis

This is the first full-length book to investigate Samuel Beckett's work through contemporary ecological thinking, offering a wide range of artistic and scholarly responses to the ecological crises provoked, mediated or challenged by Beckett's work.

Beckett was not an environmental artist, but his oeuvre, poised between forms of precarity and hope, is a rich territory for the exploration of the most pressing issues of our time: the rift between the human species, its technological and economic advancement and the ecologies that sustain it all.

In recent years, Beckett's name, aphorisms and work have been invoked relative to environmental catastrophe, helping stimulate debates on ecology, the arts and the ecosystemic place of the human. The volume reflects on ecology as a productive term, as well as the varied practices and narratives in Beckettian intermedial ecologies. While some authors offer new insights into the connections between Beckett and the Anthropocene across translation, adaptation, performance and the visual arts, others also explore the potential of Happy Days (1961) for ecological thought and the role it has taken in recent ecodramaturgical experiments in the theatre. Woven throughout the volume are short bursts of writing, 'coups de gong', which testify to the variety of Beckett-inspired local responses to global climate instability.

Review Quotes

"This volume is transformational in Beckett studies in its range of global contributors and in the dialogues it sets up between scholars, artists and activists. The book is an important and compelling addition to Beckett studies, theatre studies and ecocriticism." --Anna McMullan, University of Reading, UK

About the Author

Trish McTighe is Senior Lecturer in Drama at Queen's University Belfast, UK.

Céline Thobois-Gupta is an IRC-funded PhD researcher and an Adjunct Assistant Professor in the Department of Drama at Trinity College Dublin, Ireland, as well as an ECR Fellow at the Trinity Long Room Hub.

Nicholas E. Johnson is Associate Professor and Head of Drama at Trinity College Dublin, Ireland, where he co-directs the Trinity Centre for Beckett Studies.