Yell, Sam, If You Still Can

This novel by Maylis Besserie, the first of her Irish trilogy, showsus Samuel Beckett at the end of his life in 1989, living in Le Tiers-Temps retirement home. It is as if Beckett has come to live in oneof his own stage productions, peopled with strange, unhingedindividuals, waiting for the end of days. Yell, Sam, If You Still Can is filled with voices. From diary notes to clinical reportsto daily menus, cool medical voices provide a counterpoint toBeckett himself, who reflects on his increasingly fragile existence.He remains playful, rueful, and aware of the dramatic irony that hasbrought him to live in the room next door to Winnie, surroundedby grotesques like Hamm or Lucky, abandoned by his wife Suzannewho died before him. Besserie delights in Beckett's bilingualism and plays back and forthbetween the francophone and anglophone properties of language, summoning James Joyce as Beckett reminisces about evenings thetwo spent together singing, talking and drinking. Largely writtenin the library of the Centre Culturel Irlandais, Besserie has kept thehum of Irish voices throughout this work. Yell, Sam, If You Still Can won the "Goncourt du premier roman", the prestigiousFrench literary prize for first time novelists, just before the country went into lockdown. Besserie is now planning a further two novelsthat will explore the links between Ireland and France and is toutedas the new star of the French literary world. Financial Times Book of the Year 2022