Samuel Beckett: Overlook Illustrated Lives Book

Minus one star for not shedding enough light on Beckett's amourous affairs. Otherwise, an excellent companion book to Beckett's canon, complete with the political backgrounds of Ireland and France during his lifetime, an insightful commentary on all of his bibliography, and never before published pictures of him at work. The fact that Gerry Dukes (the author) was relatively close to Beckett and met him in person for one or two times (which is something to be raised an eyebrow at given how frugal Beckett was when granting his presence to journalists and scholars who duly requested for it) did much more than little to take this palm-sized book seriously.

For those who thought or might think this book is inadequate as a biography sketch of the enigmatic modernist after having read the book itself or the reviews here, the series is not dubbed 'Overlook Illustrated Lives' for nothing.