1. Similar Themes, Opposing Styles

2.  Similar themes  Styles differ  Compare an early work and a later work

3.  1934  Short stories  Follow life of one character  “ long sentences furnished in an elegantly cluttered style” (King).

4.  1954  Play  2 main characters  One setting  “A special virtue attaches to plays which remind the drama of how much it can do without and still exist” (“Samuel Barclay Beckett”).

5.  Inevitable  Not without pain  In various forms:  Physical  Personal Loss

6.  Death of a lobster  “it’s a quick death, God help us all. It is not” (Beckett 22).  Disease  Facing a surgery  “he was properly up against it this time” (Beckett 162).

7.  A hanging  Possibility bough will break  “ Don’t let’s do anything. It’s safer” (Beckett 13).  Changes  “ one day we were born, one day we shall die, the same day” (Beckett 58).

8.  Depiction of women  Companionship:  Necessary  Avoided

9.  Marriage  “ her death came therefore as a timely release” (Beckett 114).  “they suddenly seemed to be all dead… was the only sail in sight” (Beckett 175).  Point of View  “ the beastly punctilio of women” (Beckett 29).

10.  Master and slave  “I can’t bear it any longer… he’s killing me” (Beckett 23).  Companions  “ wonder if we wouldn’t have been better off alone” (Beckett 35).  “ Stay with me!... You let me go” (Beckett 38).

11. "for his writing, which - in new forms for the novel and drama - in the destitution of modern man acquires its elevation“ (Nobel) Why do the similarities matter?

12.  Beckett, Samuel. More Pricks than Kicks. First Evergreen Edition. Brattleboro, Vermont: The Book Press, 1972. Print.  Beckett, Samuel. Waiting for Godot. First Printing. New York, NY: Grove Press, 1954. Print.  King, John. "Reading for the Plotless: the difficult characters of Samuel Beckett's A Dream of Fair to Middling Women." Journal of Modern Literature 29.1 (2005): 133+. Literature Resource Center. Web. 25 Oct. 2010.  "Samuel (Barclay) Beckett." Contemporary Authors Online. Detroit: Gale, 2005. Literature Resource Center. Web. 25 Oct. 2010.http://go.galegroup.com/ps/i.do?&id=GALE%7CH1000 006745&v=2.1&u=txshracd2598&it=r&p=LitRC&sw=whttp://go.galegroup.com/ps/i.do?&id=GALE%7CH1000 006745&v=2.1&u=txshracd2598&it=r&p=LitRC&sw=w