ENGL 485-02, Senior Seminar: Twentieth-Century Irish Drama, Fall 2014

Abstract

No nation in the English-speaking world has produced as many important dramatists, and as many influential plays, over the past century as Ireland. This course will survey modern Ireland’s dramatic tradition against the backdrop of relevant political and cultural developments, from the establishment of Ireland’s national theatre early in the century, through Ireland’s reemergence as an autonomous nation and its bloody civil war in the teens and twenties, through its inward-looking, mid-century cultural paralysis, to its “Celtic Tiger” boom of the nineties. We will explore the ways in which a number of canonical and contemporary Irish plays engage in a dialogue with each other, with various theatrical conventions, and with key articulations of Irish national identity. The course will culminate in a major research project.