A Centenary of Missed Opportunities: A Guide to Assembling an Accurate Volume of Samuel Beckett's Dramatic "Shorts"

Despite the costly efforts and best intentions of both English-language publishers of Samuel Beckett's work and the labours of textual scholars during and just after Beckett's centenary year, Beckett's texts have improved only incrementally and inconsistently in these new centenary and post-centenary editions. This article traces some of the editions of Beckett's work generated by the centenary celebrations, the promises made for them, and the incomplete fulfilment of those promises. In particular, the article traces some of the issues surrounding the Faber editions of 2009-10, especially the author's volume of Krapp's Last Tape and other Short Plays, and appends to this critique the introduction or "Preface" as written before in-house editors at Faber truncated it. In the centenary and post-centenary years, not only have major publishing opportunities been lost, but current efforts may have retarded future corrections. It may be some time before other such efforts to correct Beckett's texts in uniform editions are launched.