Beckett’s Children: Samuel Beckett, Susan Howe, My Son, and Me

Beckett’s Children is a lyrical blend of personal memoir, father-son dialogue, and literary investigation that probes the works of Irish writer Samuel Beckett and American poet Susan Howe in search of traces of their long-rumored status as father and daughter.

Although Howe has denied the rumor, the possibility that it might be true leads Coffey to a highly original appreciation of her work and a fascinating focus on the dozens of unattended children who wander through Beckett’s oeuvre.

The saga of Coffey’s adult son, at various moments on the run in the Indiana woods or incarcerated, shines light on life without parental connection in a cold America. As an adoptee himself, Coffey looks to literature for traces of his own origin story and lineage, a heritage held in secret by a closed adoption system but which, through books and cultural signs, he has been able to decipher in his own way.

Provocative andbeautifully expressed, Beckett’s Children suggests a new approach to the textual worlds of two highly respected artists, providing a revelatory perspective on both American poetics and the vibrant world of Beckett studies.

Michael Coffey was born in Greenwich Village in 1954, adopted at birth and raised in Saranac, NY, near the Canadian border. Coffey’s career in publishing in New York City, most notably 26 years at Publishers Weekly, was punctuated with published writings of his own--three innovative books of poems, a popular book on Irish-American history, a baseball book, and a book of short stories. Since stepping down from PW in 2014, Coffey has pursued a life of scholarship focused on Samuel Beckett and the preeminent American poet Susan Howe. His hybrid fiction Samuel Beckett Is Closed was published in 2018 by Foxrock Books, in association with Evergreen Review and OR Books. The New York Times Book Review called it ＂a ghostly collaboration＂ and ＂a rewarding challenge＂ to the reader.