Samuel Beckett Is Closed

“A clever exploration of the ways in which art gives life meaning...shrewd. A stimulating and singular work.” —Publishers Weekly

A baseball game. Officially sanctioned torture. A chance encounter at a bar. A conversation between a parent and child. News reports of terrorist attacks.

These—plus a meditation on the transformative power of the undying work of Samuel Beckett—make up the interwoven strands of this short work by poet and critic Michael Coffey. Written according to a sequence laid out by Beckett in his notes to the unpublished “Long Observation of the Ray,” of which only six manuscript pages exist, this rhythm of themes and genres comprises a complex, mesmerizing work of fiction that has its roots in reality.

“In his new book—part memoir, part criticism, and part poetry—Michael Coffey deftly weaves multiple voices into a fractured but unified whole that strongly resonates with the digital age. Highly addictive, fiercely challenging, and lusciously readable—if you ever wondered what Beckett might sound like in the twenty-first century, this is it.” —Kenneth Goldsmith, author of Fidget, Day, Capital, and Wasting Time on the Internet

“Samuel Beckett Is Closed makes us experience simultaneously several narratives deployed in subtle counterpoint. These varied voices show the relevance of Beckett’s oeuvre in a world dominated by exploitation, torture, state violence and unbridled capitalism.”
—Jean-Michel Rabaté, American Academy of the Arts and Sciences, Professor of English and Comparative Literature at the University of Pennsylvania; author of Think, Pig! Beckett at the Limit of the Human