Beckett and the Manus Presse
Beckett’s loyalty to his publishers was grounded in personal relationships. While his long-standing correspondence and friendship with Siegfried Unseld of Suhrkamp is well documented, far less has been written about his connection with Stuttgart publisher Roland Hänßel and his Manus Presse. In 2025, Regensburg University Library was able to acquire Beckett’s correspondence with Roland and Waltraut Hänßel – 41 handwritten letters and postcards dated 1965-1989 – with generous funding by the Carl Friedrich von Siemens Foundation.
Specializing in original prints in limited editions, the Manus Presse realized five livres d’artiste based on works by Beckett, with graphics by Hans Martin Erhardt, who had designed the stage décor for the Schillertheater’s 1964 production of Play. Erhardt created Act Without Words (1965), Come and Go (1968), Bing (1970) and Watt (1971), while From an Abandoned Work (1967) was illustrated by Max Ernst. Beckett’s correspondence with Hänßel not only sheds light on these collaborations but also offers glimpses of publication and translation processes of other works. Enclosed with a letter is a typescript of the short play Breath, which Beckett offered to Hänßel, “Suhrkamp Verlag permitting.”
Beckett’s profound interest in art is evident in his approach to artist’s books, for which he generally granted the artists significant creative freedom, understanding them as distinct, visual readings of his works. In Bing, Erhardt’s eight white blind embossings accompany the German translation, visually echoing Beckett’s prose: the “[b]are white body white on white invisible,” with body parts “joined like sewn.”
Further reading/sources: Hartel 2011; Mitchell 1987, 1999; Nixon 2011; Oppenheim 2011; Rathjen 2013.
Bibliography
- Beckett, Samuel. Bing. With original graphics by Hans Martin Erhardt, Manus Presse, 1970.
- Hänssel, Roland, ed. Manus Presse 1961-1986. Eine Dokumentation, with Manus Presse 1987-1997. Manus Presse, [1997?]
- Hartel, Gaby. ‘“Cher Ami” - “Lieber Samuel Beckett”: Beckett and His German Publisher Suhrkamp Verlag’. Publishing Samuel Beckett, edited by Mark Nixon, British Library, 2011, pp. 131–38.
- Mitchell, Breon. ‘Seeing the Unsayable: Beckett and H.M. Erhardt.’ Beckett Translating/Translating Beckett, edited by Alan Warren Friedman et al., Pennsylvania State University Press, 1987, pp. 212–26.
- ———. ‘Six Degrees of Separation. Beckett and the Livre d’Artiste.’ Samuel Beckett and the Arts: Music, Visual Arts, and Non-Print Media, edited by Lois Oppenheim, Garland, 1999, pp. 173–98.
- Nixon, Mark, ed. Publishing Samuel Beckett. British Library, 2011.
- ———. ‘“Silly Business.” Beckett and the World of Publishing.’ Publishing Samuel Beckett, edited by Mark Nixon, British Library, 2011, pp. 1–10.
- Oppenheim, Lois. ‘Beckett and the Livre d’Artiste.’ Publishing Samuel Beckett, edited by Mark Nixon, British Library, 2011, pp. 187–204.
- Rathjen, Friedhelm. ‘Unseld/Beckett. Fußnoten zu einer Verleger-Autor-Beziehung.’ Samuel Beckett und die deutsche Literatur, edited by Jan Wilm and Mark Nixon, transcript, 2013, pp. 105–19.
