Samuel Beckett and the Arts

This book, first published in 1999, addresses Beckett's visual and musical sensibilities, and examines his visionary use of such diverse modes of creative expression as stage, radio, television and film, when his medium was the written word. The first section of the book focuses on music; the second part analyses the visual arts; and the third part examines film, radio and television. This book uncovers aspects of his thinking on, and use of the arts that have been little studied, including the nonfigurative function of music and art in Beckett's work; the 'collaborations' undertaken by composers, painters and choreographers with his texts; the relation of his literary to his visual and musical artistry; and his use of film, radio and television as innovative means and celebration of artistic process.

Lois Oppenheim

1. Words and Music: Situating Beckett Earl Kim 2. Samuel Beckett and the Arts of Time: Painting, Music, Narrative H. Porter Abbott 3. Beckett as Marsyas Daniel Albright 4. Beckett Music Charles Krance 5. The Word Man and the Note Man: Morton Feldman and Beckett's Virtual Music Guy Debrock 6. Reflections on Beckett and Music, with a Case Study: Paul Rhys's Not I Mary Bryden 7. Sceptical Pictures in the Music of Company Daniel Herwitz 8. A Statistical Analysis of Beckett's Musical Metaphors Moncef Belhadjali and Edward J. Lusk 9. Interview with Philip Glass Nicholas Zurbrugg 10. Resonant Images: Beckett and German Expressionism Jessica Prinz 11. Six Degrees of Separation: Beckett and the Livre d'Artiste Breon Mitchell 12. Nor Do My Doodles More Sagaciously: Beckett Illustrating Watt David Hayman 13. The Becketts of Mabou Mines Ruby Cohn 14. Interview with Maguy Marin Lois Oppenheim 15. The Silence That Is Not Silence: Acoustic Art in Samuel Beckett's Embers Marjorie Perloff 16. Working Wireless: Beckett's Radio Writing Stanley Richardson and Jane Alison Hale 17. All That Fall and Radio Language Clas Zilliacus 18. Meditating on Beckett, Embers and Radio Theory Everett C. Frost 19. Unswamping a Backwater: On Samuel Beckett's Film Stanley Feshbach 20. Continued Perception: Chaos Theory, the Camera and Samuel Beckett's Film and Television Work John L. Kundert-Gibbs