Bryden, Mary (Professor) — Library

Mary Bryden (1953-2015) was educated at Eastbourne High School for Girls before studying for a French degree at the University of Reading (1971-75) and an MA in modern languages at Salford University (1980-82). In 1987 Mary Bryden returned to Reading to pursue a PhD on Beckett, which formed the basis for her book Women in Samuel Beckett’s Prose and Drama: Her Own Other (1993). She was appointed Beckett Research Fellow, while working part-time in the Library’s Beckett Archive, and later Associate Director of the Beckett International Foundation. After a few years spent teaching at tertiary level (with an RSA Diploma in Teaching English as a foreign language to adults) and a short spell in administration, she started her academic career at Reading lecturing in French studies from 1995, where she returned as professor of French studies in 2007 after a four-year interlude at Cardiff University. In 2012, after being diagnosed with a malignant tumor, Professor Bryden retired and was appointed emeritus.

Mary Bryden is the author of several studies on Samuel Beckett, twentieth-century French literature, philosophy, and culture, such as Samuel Beckett and the Idea of God (1998) and Deleuze and Religion (2001), as well as her seminal work on women in Beckett’s prose and drama.  She also edited literary anthologies and collections of critical essays. Her creative writing won her a BBC short story competition.

As well as the important role played in the Beckett Archive and Beckett International Foundation, professor Bryden held many visiting appointments in various British and European institutions and her media work included numerous live and recorded interviews.

Professor Bryden died on 5 November 2015.

(from the Times Higher Education obituary, December 10, 2015 ; and Journal of Beckett Studies 25:1, 2016, by J. Knowlson)

LIBRARY

The library collection mostly includes plays and dramatic works by 20^th century French authors, who influenced Samuel Beckett, such as Jean Cocteau, Maurice Maeterlinck, Jean Anouilh and H.R. Lenormand among others.  The primary texts are mainly in the original French, with some translations and bi-lingual editions. The criticism and secondary sources are both in French and English, including anthologies and collections of essays by the French playwrights. Among the journals there is a substantial run of the rare magazine La petite illustration – théâtre (1913-1939)  

The collection was acquired in 2023 and was a joint gift from James Knowlson and Prue Gillett in memory of their dear friend and colleague Professor Mary Bryden.

More information:

The library collection is fully catalogued and available on Enterprise

Associated collections:

Beckett Collection https://collections.reading.ac.uk/special-collections/collections/beckett-collection-published-works/

Knowlson, James & Elizabeth Library https://collections.reading.ac.uk/special-collections/collections/james-and-elizabeth-knowlson-archive-and-library/