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Comparative literature Celebrates the Reissue of Professor Clas Zilliacus’s Groundbreaking Doctoral Dissertation

Professor emeritus Clas Zilliacus defended his doctoral dissertation in Comparative literature, Beckett and Broadcasting, at Åbo Akademi University in 1976. The dissertation, which examines Samuel Beckett’s works for radio and television, has long been out of print but is now being reissued—something that is highly unusual for a work of this kind.

Samuel Beckett was a Nobel Prize–winning Irish dramatist and author, best known for works such as Waiting for Godot. The dissertation, which approaches Beckett’s radio and television texts from an interdisciplinary perspective, was innovative in many respects. It laid the groundwork for much of what contemporary research now focuses on: media studies, intermediality, and adaptation, and it continues to be widely cited in Beckett scholarship.

The reprint of the dissertation includes a substantial new introduction by Zilliacus. This introduction comments on the current state of research in the field and benefits from the perspective offered by half a century of scholarship. The book also contains a newly written afterword by Galina Kiryushina, a specialist in Beckett and intermediality. The afterword recounts, among other things, how students and doctoral candidates around the world have circulated copies of the long out‑of‑print dissertation, which has even become a collector’s item.

“That a doctoral dissertation in Comparative literature submitted in 1976 is being republished in the United Kingdom fifty years later is a rare event,” says Professor Mia Österlund. “But it is an event that testifies to the pioneering nature of Beckett and Broadcasting.”

At Åbo Akademi University, Zilliacus worked in various roles from 1967 to 2007. As a long‑serving professor of Comparative literature at Åbo Akademi University, Clas Zilliacus shaped and influenced the development of the discipline.

“His spirit lives on within the subject. Not least, his stylistic brilliance remains a guiding principle. The ‘Zilliacian’ spirit is one of international collaboration. Clas was eager to bring students along on his travels in Europe and was committed to a deeply probing and critically minded approach to literary studies. Through the work Finlands svenska litteraturhistoria (2000), he also left his mark on how we view Finland‑Swedish fiction.”