Irish Drama, Modernity and the Passion Play - 9781349949625

This book discusses Irish Passion plays (plays that rewrite or parody the story of the Passion of Christ) in modern Irish drama from the Irish Literary Revival to the present day. It offers innovative readings of such canonical plays as J. M. SyngeÆs The Playboy of the Western World, W. B. YeatsÆs Calvary, Brendan BehanÆs The Hostage, Samuel BeckettÆs Endgame, Brian FrielÆs Faith Healer and Tom MurphyÆs Bailegangaire, as well as of less well-known plays by Padraic Pearse, Lady Gregory, G. B. Shaw, Seßn OÆCasey, Denis Johnston, Samuel Beckett and David Lloyd. Challenging revisionist readings of the rhetoric of ôblood sacrificeö and martyrdom in the Irish Republican tradition, it argues that the Passion play is a powerful political genre which centres on the staged death of the (usually male) protagonist, and makes visible the usually invisible violence perpetrated both by colonial power and by the postcolonial state in the name of modernity.

• | Author: Alexandra Poulain
• | Publisher: Palgrave Macmillan
• | Publication Date: Jan 26, 2017
• | Number of Pages: 276 pages
• | Language: English
• | Binding: Hardcover/Performing Arts
• | ISBN-10: 1349949620
• | ISBN-13: 9781349949625