Worldwide plans for Beckett centenary unveiled

Actor Sir John Hurt in front of a picture of Samuel Beckett at the launch of the Beckett Centenary Festival, Dublin

Actor Sir John Hurt in front of a picture of Samuel Beckett at the launch of the Beckett Centenary Festival, Dublin

Countries around the world are to hold events to mark the forthcoming centenary of the birth of Samuel Beckett in a bid to ensure his work lives on.

Michael Colgan, director of the Gate Theatre who is chairing the Beckett Centenary Committee, confirmed his work would be performed in Dublin, London, France, Japan and 10 US cities.

Mr Colgan said the performances of the Dublin-born man's work during April's Beckett Centenary Festival would be a good chance for new audiences to access the writer behind plays including Waiting for Godot, Endgameand Footfalls.

"They will be a great way of reaching new audiences for people to get into Beckett and to understand and not to be afraid of it," he said.

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"The other thing is for Ireland to just stake its claim and say we have given birth to great literary giants, and when their centenary comes along we should celebrate them."

Actor John Hurt, who will star in Krapp's Last Tapeat the Gate Theatre in April, said: "People are afraid of serious, and I don't quite know why, because serious is interesting but serious isn't necessarily gloomy or pompous of any of those other words that sometimes mistakenly go with serious."

As well as the plays taking place at the Gate Theatre, the festival will also include displays of portraits based on the playwright's work, an exhibition of photographs and other outdoor events.

Beckett was born in Foxrock, Co Dublin on April 13th, 1906.

In the late 1930s he settled permanently in Paris where his most famous work, Waiting for Godot, was later performed in 1953. The shy playwright, who wrote most of his major work in French, received the Nobel Prize for Literature in 1969.