Some Notes on Beckett and Michelangelo

Beckett’s deep immersion in the visual images of the Italian Old Masters emerges in the pages of several scholars, although this story has yet to be told in coherent and comprehensive terms. This essay focuses mainly on the Irish playwright’s interest in, not to say fascination with, Michelangelo Buonarrotti, a giant through whom he may have found his artistic way. From his first published story, "Assumption" to "Catastrophe," in which Protagonist stands on a plinth like a sculpture, Michelangelo was firmly rooted in Beckett’s mind and played a pivotal role in his theatre, a role that was somehow impossible to describe with precision but inescapable.