Book Description
Beckett's early tragic-comic masterpiece is a collection of
stories about Belacqua, a student in Dublin in the 1920 - his adventures,
encounters and amours - that through its original style and wry commentary
succeeds in turning every-day incidents into high drama and lets us see
street and university life through the observance and caustic wit of the
author.
Highly enjoyable to read, it delights in exuberant language and the
pleasure of discovery, very typical of the young writer who in the post-war
years was to astonish the world with "Waiting for Godot" and "Molloy".
First published in 1934, "More Pricks than Kicks" is Beckett's second work
of fiction. It serves as an excellent introduction to his later work.
About the Author
Samuel Beckett was born in a suburb of Dublin in 1906 and died
in Paris in 1989. After school in Northern Ireland he went to Trinity
College in Dublin where he distinguished himself in French and Italian and
was recognised as a brilliant scholar, who under an exchange arrangement
taught at the Ecole Normale Supérieure before becoming a writer. He left
Ireland and finally settled in Paris, staying in France during the war
where he was a courier in the Résistance. He won the Nobel Prize in 1969
and is now recognised as one of the major writers of the 20th century.