SAMUEL BECKETT was born in 1906 near Dublin. In 1927, he graduated from Trinity College, where he eventually taught. His early work includes the long poem “Whoroscope” and essay “Proust,” followed by short stories collected in More Pricks Than Kicks and Echo’s Bones, a collection of verse. During WWII, he played an active part in the French Resistance. Following the war, he wrote a trilogy of novels, Malloy, Malone Dies and The Unnamable. His landmark play, Waiting for Godot, was completed in 1950 and premiered in Paris in 1953. He went on to write many others, including Endgame and Happy Days. Until his death in 1989, he continued to write short plays including Not I, Footfalls, Ghost Trio, Rockaby, Catastrophe and What Where. His later works of fiction include Worstward Ho and Stirrings Still. In 1969, Beckett was awarded the Nobel Prize for Literature.