22 Comments

1. January 4th, 2012 / 10:36 pm ravi—

   I believe it was actually a tandem bicycle they rode to the school.

2. January 4th, 2012 / 10:41 pm Brooks Sterritt—

   Thank you for that, haha. I picture Dre in the rear for stability.

3. January 4th, 2012 / 10:43 pm Wastrel—

   http://www.johnmenick.com/2008/06/notes-on-hearsay

   Person in the comments says it was mentioned in an A&E biography and the Princess Bride DVD.

4. January 4th, 2012 / 10:50 pm Brooks Sterritt—

   Wow, much obliged. Seemed sort of apocryphal but I really wanted it to be true.

5. January 4th, 2012 / 11:16 pm Scottmcclanahan—

   I’m almost positive it’s mentioned in the Knowlson bio Damned to Fame.

6. January 4th, 2012 / 11:46 pm Brooks Sterritt—

   Thanks. I’ve been wanting to read that for a while but don’t have a copy. “Search inside” on amazon shows no mention of Andre (real or stage names) in the index, but many mentions of Beckett’s cottage at Ussy-sur-Marne. I’ll check the library or maybe just bite the bullet and get a copy….

7. January 5th, 2012 / 1:04 am Wdoakneal—

   I think I remember reading something about it in Anthony Cronin’s biography of him, The Last Modernist. Which is pretty good even if this shit ain’t true.

8. January 5th, 2012 / 1:23 am deadgod—

   That blogicle links to the wiki for “Andre the Giant”, where I couldn’t find a mention of Cary Elwes’s “video diary” that Menick quotes.

   However, look, in that wiki, at Early Life — and especially the link at footnote 11:  http://historicalmeetups.com/post/1524567373/samuel-beckett-playwright-novelist-nobel .  (The 1473 (+?) “notes” form a posthumously written Beckett piece.)

   I can confirm, from my own imagination, that when the young Andre complained that the other kids were mercilessly French towards him and he didn’t know how he could “go on”, Beckett’s customarily tonic salve was, “‘I can’t go on, blah blah’–bah, fuck those fucking kids the fuck up, son.”

9. January 5th, 2012 / 1:30 am Ester—

   It’s mentioned as a fact in the British TV show QI (hosted by Stephen Fry) and they have serious fact checking. Is that proof? Nope. But it’s the best I can do. Of course, for the sheer bizarre poetry of it, I so want to believe it’s true.

10. January 5th, 2012 / 1:40 am Brooks Sterritt—

    though i expect Andre would clean most merciless kids’ clocks

11. January 5th, 2012 / 2:00 am reynard—

    i’ve told that story to people

12. January 5th, 2012 / 3:26 am shaun gannon—

    dammit thats what i wanted to say

13. January 5th, 2012 / 3:44 am SFBAY—

    It’s mentioned briefly in Andre the Giant: A Legendary Life. 

    http://books.google.com/books?id=u8RNM7QmEqkC&pg=PA4&dq=samuel+beckett+andre+wrestler&hl=en&sa=X&ei=QVQFT-GlCeKjiALo85TfCA&ved=0CDAQ6AEwAA#v=onepage&q=samuel%20beckett%20andre%20wrestler&f=false

14. January 5th, 2012 / 12:12 pm Montesquiou—

    The article you used wonders what they talked about (“wrestling?”), & I remembered reading that “years later, when recounting his conversations with Beckett (which he did often), André the Giant revealed that they rarely talked about anything besides cricket.” 

    Although, of course, the site doesn’t cite…

    http://historicalmeetups.com/post/1524567373/samuel-beckett-playwright-novelist-and-nobel

15. January 5th, 2012 / 12:23 pm Mark Doten—

    imagining the narrator of one of the late, “closed space” fictions getting super pissed cos Andre is hogging all the goddamn closed space. 

16. January 5th, 2012 / 12:46 pm Scottmcclanahan—

    Brooks, I think I’m wrong.   I got up this morning and looked through my copy of the Knowlson bio and couldn’t find it.   Actually, I think I first heard it mentioned on the A&E program Biography on Andre the Giant.   You could probably find it on youtube.

17. January 5th, 2012 / 1:01 pm alex crowley—

    Brooks, you’re thinking of Billy Crystal and Gheorghe Muresan.

18. January 5th, 2012 / 2:36 pm deadgod—

    sleeper hold

    garbage-can bearhug

19. January 5th, 2012 / 5:05 pm Brooks Sterritt—

    No worries, Scott. Reading through the bio’s index reminded me I need that thing (the Andre the Giant reference being somewhat secondary, ha). Knowlson’s bio seems like THE bio of Beckett.

20. January 5th, 2012 / 5:10 pm Neel—

    I’ve told that story to people.

21. January 5th, 2012 / 8:50 pm Cvan—

    Well, Flann O’Brien always claimed it was true…and he never ever never told tales.

22. January 7th, 2012 / 10:23 am kevo—

    i lived in paris in the 80’s, along with my brother. the brother had bad teeth problems and couldn’t face a french dentist as he didn’t have the lingo. his boss eventually got him an (hard to get) appointment with an english guy who moonlighted as illustrator for beckett covers. sure enough, when the brother, in great pain, entered the waiting room, there sat sam. they exchanged nods and waited. when the assistant called for beckett, he looked at the brother and said Go ahead son. the brother said No, you go. Beckett said No, you go. this continued for a minute, then the brother tood, shook his hand, and went.