SOURCE: “The Honour of Naming: Samuel Beckett and Brian Friel,” in A Critical History of Modern Irish Drama 1891-1980, Cambridge University Press, 1984, pp. 188-212.

In the following excerpt, Maxwell compares and contrasts the plays of Samuel Beckett and Brian Friel.

(i)

Martin. I was the like of the little children do be listening to the stories of an old woman, and do be dreaming after in the dark night it's in grand houses of gold they are, with speckled horses to ride, and do be waking again, in a short while, and they destroyed with the cold, and the thatch dripping maybe, and the starved ass braying in the yard.

The Well of the Saints

Estragon. You and your landscapes! Tell me about the worms!

Vladimir. All the same, you can't tell me that this (gesture) bears any resemblance to … (he hesitates) … to the Macon country for example...