著者

菊地 幸子

出版者

英米文化学会

雑誌

英米文化 (ISSN:09173536)

巻号頁・発行日

no.39, pp.95-107, 2009-03-31

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Brian Friel founded Field Day Theatre Company in 1980 and tried to offer the responses to the Northern Ireland problem through art. Friel's preoccupation with defining Irishness is presented through politics, history and language especially in Translations and Making History, which were performed by Field Day. However, Dancing at Lughnasa and Wonderful Tennessee, which were both written for the Abbey Theatre and premiered in the early 1990s, move away from the historical and political dimensions and they give quite different impressions from the plays written for Field Day. Both Dancing at Lughnasa and Wonderful Tennessee are set in modern Ireland and they examine the private lives of the characters in relations to the family. Hence it seems that Friel changed his approach. Therefore, in this paper I will study these two plays and find if Friel's search for Irishness continues in them.