The Historical and Colonial Context of Brian Friel’s Translations
Regarded by many as Brian Friel’s theatrical masterpiece, Seamus Deane described Translations as “a sequence of events in history which are transformed by his writing into a parable of events in the present day” (Introduction 22). The play was first produced in Derry in 1980. It was the first production by Field Day, a cultural arts group founded by Friel and the actor Stephen Rea, and associated with Deane, Seamus Heaney and Tom Paulin.
As Deane asserts, the play is in many respects an intelligent and enlightening metaphor for the situation in Northern Ireland. The aims of raising cultural awareness and dispelling socio-political apathy in the North were central to the objectives of the Field Day group. However, despite Friel’s concerns with contemporary Ireland, the play is also an enchanting fictive account of the Irish experience of British colonialism. My aim in this page is to firmly place Translations within its historical context, in order to understand the representation of colonialism in the play and to facilitate further post-colonial readings.
Translations may be located both temporally and spatially to a fixed point in Irish history. The characters hail from Baile Beag, renamed with the anglicised title of Ballybeg. The action of the play occurs over a number of days towards the end of August 1833. Before delving into the play it is clear, from these most general of points, that the mise-en-scene of Translations is a period of great significance in the colonial relationship between Ireland and England.
The lifetime of Hugh and Jimmy Jack, the sixty years or so running up to 1833, bore witness to many important events in the metamorphosis of Ireland from a rural Gaelic society to a modern colonial nation. To go back another seven decades, in 1704 penal laws were enacted “which decreed that a Catholic could not hold any office of state, nor stand for Parliament, vote, join the army or navy, practise at the bar nor....buy land” (Kee Ireland: A History 54). Thus, by 1778 a mere five per cent of the land of Ireland was owned by Catholics. The Irish people (most notably Catholics, though Protestants also) such as those portrayed in Translations suffered severe discrimination, poverty and hardship.
The French Revolution of 1789 jolted Irish political thinking into a new fr...
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... to speak English and every subject will be taught through English (396).
Maire’s desire, at the opening of the play, to speak English shall soon be enforced by law throughout the National Schools in Ireland. Where Dan O’Connell and Maire both assumed the use of English would allow progress towards their respective national and personal dreams, Hugh believes that English was simply for “commerce” but that it “couldn’t really express us (the Irish)” (418). He realised that the use of Gaelic, of remaining true to their own traditions was a method of resisting colonialism, “our only method of replying to .... inevitabilities” (418).
Perhaps the most ironic passage in the play appears during a conversation between Yolland and Hugh. Hugh indulges himself the smiling position of condescending to the young soldier, dismissing William Wordsworth (and by implication English Literature):
Wordsworth?.... No I’m afraid we’re not familiar with your literature, Lieutenant. .... We tend to overlook your island (417).
Poignantly, within a relatively short period of time the poetry of Wordsworth, and of the English canon, would be read and recited by the majority of children in Ireland.
How Friel Involves his Audience in the Conflict Between Coloniser and Colonised in his Play Translations
Included within the anthology The Penguin Book of Irish Fiction,1[1] are the works of great Irish authors written from around three hundred years ago, until as recently as the last decade. Since one might expect to find in an anthology such as this only expressions and interpretations of Irish or European places, events or peoples, some included material could be quite surprising in its contrasting content. One such inclusion comes from the novel Black Robe,2[2] by Irish-born author Brian Moore. Leaving Ireland as a young man afforded Moore a chance to see a great deal of the world and in reflection afforded him a great diversity of setting and theme in his writings. And while his Black Robe may express little of Ireland itself, it expresses much of Moore in his exploration into evolving concepts of morality, faith, righteousness and the ever-changing human heart.
Stade, George, and Karen Karbiener. “Heaney Seamus.” Bloom’s Literature. Facts on File, Inc. Web. 30 Mar. 2014
A conquered people leave behind little in records. This statement is certainly true of the Irish after the Elizabethan and Cromwellian conquest of Britain. Historians must then search for a reliable source for the history of those conquered.. Luckily, Ireland has a long legacy of bardic poetry. In the four papers we read in this class, four authors, Brendan Bradshaw, Nicholas Canny, T.J. Dunne and Bernadette Cunningham, already analyzed these poems. Each has come to different, separate conclusions, about how the conquest effected the native Irish. The opinions vary. Brenden Bradshaw sees a new nationalism arise. The others disagree. T.J. Dunne
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...ly progressed from a way to tell stories about kings and gods to a way to tell stories about ordinary human beings. By moving our focus off of nobility, the language of plays became the language of every individual, and eventually, due to America’s “melting pot” culture, the language itself became individual. The unique language of American dramatic characters represents not only the diversity of the American people, but also the diversity of all human beings. These dramatically dissimilar differences were not typical of older plays when they were written, but now, they are what make American drama so valuable. Our acceptance and love for characters with different values than ours is representative of the love we can develop for those who are different from us. It represents the worldview that our current culture idealizes and strives to achieve: acceptance for all.
The war between Iraq and Iran initiated in 1980 and it lasted eight years (3). The invasion of Kuwait started on the second of August 1990. There are reasons and consequences for this invasion that I am going to talk about in this essay
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The sheer amount of positive effects the legalization of weed could have in America greatly outnumber what little negative consequences it could bring. I believe that America will see the complete legalization of marijuana within the next ten years. All it will take for weed to become legal is for voters to realize that legalizing weed is not the same as condoning it. Many Americans would outlaw fast food, tanning beds, alcohol, and smoking because of the harm they cause, but they do not because it is accepted that these things are a choice. It is time America sees marijuana from the same
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In conclusion, although there are many advocates that claim that with the legalization of marijuana the United States can place a tax on it, use marijuana for medical purposes, and use marijuana as a resource. There are still many Americans that condone the legalization of marijuana and therefore this issue is going to continue to attract many spectators throughout our nation even if it gets legalized or not. One thing is for certain marijuana is still a crime to sell, possess, and grow in the United States through the Controlled Substances Act of 1970.
Behan, Brendan. The Quare Fellow. Modern Irish Drama. Ed. John P. Harrington. New York: W.W. Norton & Co, Inc, 1991. 255-310.
2. Setterquist, Jan. Ibsen and the Beginnings of Anglo-Irish Drama. New York: Gordian Press, 1974. 46 - 49, 58 - 59, 82 - 93, 154 - 166.
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Religion in James Joyce's Dubliners Religion was an integral part of Ireland during the modernist period, tightly woven into the social fabric of its citizens. The Catholic Church was a longstanding tradition of Ireland. In the modernist spirit of breaking away from forces that inhibited growth, the church stood as one of the principal barriers. This is because the Catholic faith acted as the governing force of its people, as portrayed in James Joyce’s Dubliners. In a period when Ireland was trying to legitimize their political system, religious affiliations further disillusioned the political process. The governing body of a people needs to provide a behavioral framework, through its constitution, and a legal process to make delegations on issues of equity and fairness. When religion dominates the government that is in tact, it subjects its citizens to their religious doctrines. In terms of Catholicism in Ireland, this meant that social progress and cultural revolutions were in terms of what the church would allow. The modernist realized that this is what paralyzed the Irish society of the times. In the stories of Dubliners the legal system is replaced by the institute of religion, and it is the presence and social context of the Catholic Church which prevents the Irish community from advancement. ...