120012 SE Literary Seminar / BA-Arbeit: Classic Irish Drama (2008W)

Although there is virtually no Irish theatre tradition to speak of before the 1890s, Irish theatre and drama in the 20th century is arguably the most important field of cultural discourse in which questions of cultural politics and national identity have been negotiated: viz.
- the quest for cultural identity and the Abbey Theatre as a national theatre for Ireland (John M. Synge, Sean O'Casey);
- the post-WW II avant-garde (Samuel Beckett and the Theatre of the Absurd);
- the Field Day Movement (Brian Friel);
- representations of the New Ireland/Celtic Tiger Ireland of the 1990s (Martin McDonagh).
Plays and playwrights to be studied in detail are:
John M. Synge, The Playboy of the Western World (1907); Sean O'Casey, The Silver Tassie (1928); Samuel Beckett, All That Fall (1957) (radio play), Brian Friel, Translations (1980); Martin McDonagh, The Cripple of Inishmaan (1997).