“This bugger thinks he is a saint now”: Flann O’Brien and Samuel Beckett

• Germán Asensio Peral ^[1]
  1. [1] Universidad de Almería

     Universidad de Almería

     Almería, España

     
• Localización: Thresholds and Ways Forward in English Studies / coord. por María Lourdes López Ropero, Sara Prieto García-Cañedo, José Antonio Sánchez Fajardo, 2020, ISBN 978-84-1302-079-2, págs. 59-68
• Idioma: inglés
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• Resumen

  • Irish writer Edna O’Brien once wrote that “along with Joyce and Beckett, Flann O’Brien constitutes our trinity of great Irish writers.” Questions of influence of James Joyce (1882- 1941) over either Samuel Beckett (1906-1989) and Flann O’Brien (1911-1966) have been exhaustively investigated. However, Beckett and O’Brien’s personal and literary relationship has been, save for a few exceptions, largely neglected by scholars. This paper aims at detecting the points of convergence and contention between both Irish writers from both a biographical and artistic standpoint. The final purpose is to demonstrate that O’Brien and Beckett’s commonalities go beyond merely being Joyce’s heirs and pivotal figures in the (post)modernist arena. Special attention will be devoted to Beckett’s Molloy (1951) and O’Brien’s At Swim-Two-Birds (1939), as it is my contention that O’Brien and Beckett’s similar artistic temperament emerges to the fore when these novels are studied in conjunction.