25 Samuel Beckett Quotes From the Irish Playwright You Can Read While You Wait
Published August 10, 2022
Samuel Barclay Beckett, the Irish writer, playwright, theatre director, and poet, was known for his bleak writing.
His works were tragi-comedies that expressed a darker outlook on existence and life experiences.
Even though Beckett was Irish, he was a resident of Paris for most of his adult life; and he wrote in both French and English.
His best-known work is Waiting for Godot, a play from 1953 where two characters, Vladimir (Didi) and Estragon (Gogo), engage in philosophical discussions and have several weird encounters with other characters while waiting for Godot, who never arrives.
These Samuel Beckett quotes from Waiting for Godot give us a brief glance into the wisdom these two impart while they wait.
His black comedies, often sprinkled with bits of nonsense, became more minimalistic in his career.
In 1969 Beckett won the Nobel Prize in Literature “for his writing, which—in new forms for the novel and drama—in the destitution of modern man acquires its elevation.”
Keep reading for more Samuel Beckett quotes about love, failure, and life in general!
Don’t forget to also check out these G.K. Chesterton quotes from one of the greatest writers of his time.
Check out our most popular quote article, a list of short inspirational quotes for daily inspiration.
Check out our inspirational quotes category page for more inspirational life quotes.
Famous Samuel Beckett quotes and lines from Waiting for Godot
1. “There’s no lack of void.” ― Samuel Beckett
2. “I’m like that. Either I forget right away or I never forget.” ― Samuel Beckett
3. “To every man his little cross. Till he dies. And is forgotten.” ― Samuel Beckett
4. “Nothing happens. Nobody comes, nobody goes. It’s awful.” ― Samuel Beckett
5. “There is man in his entirety, blaming his shoe when his foot is guilty.” ― Samuel Beckett
6. “There’s man all over for you, blaming on his boots the faults of his feet.” ― Samuel Beckett
7. “We have time to grow old. The air is full of our cries. But habit is a great deadener.” ― Samuel Beckett
8. “Let us not then speak ill of our generation, it is not any unhappier than its predecessors.” ― Samuel Beckett
9. “The tears of the world are a constant quantity. For each one who begins to weep somewhere else, another stops. The same is true of the laugh.” ― Samuel Beckett
10. “Was I sleeping while the others suffered? Am I sleeping now? Tomorrow, when I wake or think I do, what shall I say of today? That with Estragon, my friend, at this place, until the fall of night, I waited for Godot?” ― Samuel Beckett
Check out our collection of Bertolt Brecht quotes if you enjoy this article.
Samuel Beckett quotes from Endgame
11. “Nothing is funnier than unhappiness.” ― Samuel Beckett
12. “The end is in the beginning and yet you go on.” ― Samuel Beckett
13. “You cried for night; it falls: now cry in darkness.” ― Samuel Beckett
14. “All lifelong, the same questions, the same answers.” ― Samuel Beckett
15. “Old endgame lost of old, play and lose and have done with losing.” ― Samuel Beckett
16. “There’s something dripping in my head. A heart, a heart in my head.” ― Samuel Beckett
17. “Use your head, can’t you, use your head, you’re on earth, there’s no cure for that!” ― Samuel Beckett
18. “I love order. It’s my dream. A world where all would be silent and still, and each thing in its last place, under the last dust.” ― Samuel Beckett
19. “Enough, it’s time it ended in the refuge too. And yet I hesitate, I hesitate to… to end. Yes, there it is, it’s time it ended and yet I hesitate to—to end.” ― Samuel Beckett
20. “Then one day, suddenly, it ends, it changes, I don’t understand, it dies, or it’s me, I don’t understand that either. I ask the words that remain sleeping, waking, morning, evening. They have nothing to say.” ― Samuel Beckett
Samuel Beckett quotes and lines on love
21. “God is love. Yes or no? No.” ― Samuel Beckett
22. “That desert of loneliness and recrimination that men call love.” ― Samuel Beckett
23. “The old endless chain of love, tolerance, indifference, aversion, and disgust.” ― Samuel Beckett
24. “If you do not love me, I shall not be loved. If I do not love you, I shall not love.” ― Samuel Beckett
25. “Love, that is all I asked, a little love, daily, twice daily, fifty years of twice-daily love like a Paris horse butcher’s regular. What normal woman wants affection?” ― Samuel Beckett
What did you learn from these Samuel Beckett quotes?
Samuel Beckett didn’t just write great plays and pieces of fiction.
His real-life story has quite a few story-worthy incidents!
A notorious Pimp (who went by the name Prudent) stabbed Beckett in the chest and nearly killed him in January 1938.
The publicity surrounding the assault was part of the reason Beckett reconnected with Suzanne Dechevaux-Dumesnil, who he had met from his first stay in Paris.
After this, the pair began what would be their lifelong companionship.
During a hearing, Beckett asked Prudent why he stabbed him and Prudent replied: “Je ne sais pas, Monsieur.
Je m’excuse (I do not know, sir. I’m sorry.).”
Beckett dropped the charges partly because he ended up liking Prudent, and partly because he didn’t want to deal with the process of court.
Beckett also took a stand with the French Resistance, working as a courier during WWII.
He evaded being caught by the Gestapo’s until August 1942, when his unit was betrayed.
He and Suzanne fled to a more southern town, where he continued to aid the Resistance by storing armaments in the backyard of his home.
It was during that time that he worked on his novel, Watt.
He is a fascinating piece of literary history.
Learn about another influential playwright with these Lorraine Hansberry quotes.
Let us know if you have any other favorite Samuel Beckett quotes and sayings using the comment section.
