Beckett Reviewing Macgreevy: A Reconsideration (Critical Essay‪)‬

Beckett's friendship with Thomas MacGreevy was one of the most important sustaining bonds of his young adult life, particularly during the nineteen thirties. The pair exchanged letters on a regular basis, and MacGreevy's patient ear was an important outlet for a frustrated young writer who had yet to find his own voice. James Knowlson confirms that theirs was 'a genuine dialogue in which for a long time Beckett was passionately involved'. (1) For this reason, J.C.C. Mays's contention that the pair carried on a 'complicated dialogue' in their work and correspondence is an insight worthy of development. (2) Here, I shall re-examine Beckett's opinion of MacGreevy's poetry, as evinced in two short pieces: the Bookman essay 'Recent Irish Poetry' (1934), and the Dublin Magazine review 'Humanistic Quietism' (1934). The critical consensus is that Beckett viewed MacGreevy's work benevolently, complimenting it in letters, poems, and reviews. Susan Schreibman, for example, finds that MacGreevy is the only poet that Beckett 'unequivocally praises' in 'Recent Irish Poetry', (3) while Sinead Mooney describes the 1934 review as an 'unexpectedly moving and sensitive appreciation of the devout Catholic MacGreevy's rapt lyricism'. (4) Mary Bryden also believes that Beckett promotes MacGreevy's 'Humanistic Quietism' as a 'positive value' in his review, suggesting that it forms a basis for Beckett's own intellectual position. (5) Chris Ackerley denies this claim, offering a different reading of Beckett's views on quietism, but he still reads the review benevolently, as an 'expression of friendship'. (6) Terence Brown describes the review as 'an admiring celebratory essay'. (7) I want to suggest that Beckett and MacGreevy differ quite sharply in their views on poetry, that these views reflect tensions arising from their different attitudes to religious faith, and that Beckett's published responses to MacGreevy's work are more usefully read as a tactful equivocation on his part.