Negotiating Humanness Through the Myth of Irish Identity in the Plays of Martin Mcdonagh
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“IT DEPENDS ON THE FELLA. AND THE CAT.”: NEGOTIATING HUMANNESS THROUGH THE MYTH OF IRISH IDENTITY IN THE PLAYS OF MARTIN MCDONAGH DISSERTATION Presented in Partial Fulfillment of the Requirements for the Degree Doctor of Philosophy in the Graduate School of the Ohio State University By Ann Dillon Farrelly, M.A. ***** The Ohio State University 2004 Dissertation Committee: Approved by Dr. Joy Reilly, Adviser Dr. Lesley Ferris ___________________________ Dr. Esther Beth Sullivan Adviser Theatre Graduate Program ABSTRACT This dissertation focuses on the work of the new Irish playwright, Martin McDonagh, and where he fits in the rich tradition of Irish drama. The specific focus is an exploration of each of McDonagh’s five produced plays on Ireland: The Beauty Queen of Leenane, A Skull in Connemara, The Lonesome West, The Cripple of Inishmaan, and The Lieutenant of Inishmore. By tracing through the history of Irish drama from the establishment of the Irish Literary Theatre at the turn of the century to Friel and on to the present, this dissertation demonstrates how McDonagh’s drama offers a new voice for Ireland. This dissertation focuses on a few key individuals and their “benchmark” plays which laid the groundwork for McDonagh: W. B. Yeats, Lady Gregory, and J. M. Synge, Sean O’Casey, Samuel Beckett, and Brian Friel. In addition, this dissertation examines the notion of Irish identity and what that has meant to the other Irish playwrights. ii McDonagh’s plays have developed a reputation for being dark and desperate comedies that shine a light on the wickedness of the human spirit. This dissertation takes issue with those misinterpretations and focuses on the empowering nature of McDonagh’s message. Within each play, McDonagh creates exaggerated worlds in which the people defy tradition and invent their own moral codes. These exaggerated communities exist to teach the audience—and, more specifically, the Irish people—that they are no longer required to let the traditional power structures control their lives. In the worlds created by McDonagh, the people truly are the masters of their fate and the captains of their soul. McDonagh’s plays explore what it means to be human through the centering of the following four binaries: faith and reason, autonomy and responsibility, humans and nature, and individual and community. While the Irish drama of the past has illustrated how the Irish people have always privileged one side of each binary, McDonagh’s characters have negotiated these binaries and found the peaceful center. iii I would like to dedicate this dissertation to my nana, Margaret Higgins, who came over to the United States from Ireland when she was a teenager to find a better life. I am a product of her courage, and I will miss her deeply. iv ACKNOWLEDGEMENTS I would like to give very special thanks to Dr. Joy Reilly for her wonderful guidance throughout my four years at The Ohio State University and especially with regards to this dissertation. Her knowledge and love of Irish theatre was invaluable, and her interest in my area of research was unfailing. In addition, I would like to thank all of my professors in the theatre department for their support and expertise, especially Dr. Tom Postlewait, Dr. Lesley Ferris, Dr. Alan Woods, and Dr. Esther Beth Sullivan. I would like to thank my parents, Jim and Barbara Farrelly for instilling in me a love of literature and of all things Irish. For believing in me every step of the way and for knowing this day would come even when I doubted it, I owe them everything. I would like to thank my brother, Mark, for all of the late night conversations about theatre theory and for his support. I would also like to thank my friends, especially those in P. Camp, who made me laugh everyday. v VITA May 24, 1974…………………………………………………………………Born-Dayton, Ohio 1999…………………………………………M.A. English, University of Dayton 1997-1999……………………………………………Graduate Teaching Assistant, University of Dayton, Dayton, Ohio 2000-present……………………………………Graduate Teaching Associate, The Ohio State University PUBLICATIONS 1. Co-authored the text and video selection for a CD-ROM that accompanies The Theater Experience, 9th edition, Edwin Wilson, McGraw-Hill: 2004. 2. Co-authored content for portions of the website that accompanies The Theater Experience, 9th edition, Edwin Wilson, McGraw-Hill: 2004. 3. "Chapter 17: Innovations in Technology," co-authored with Katie Whitlock, Introducing Theatre, 8th edition, Joy H. Reilly and M. Scott Phillips, Thomson Learning: 2002. 4. "Teaching the Play," 3 sections, Types of Drama, 8th edition, Sylvan Barnet, William Burto, Lesley Ferris, and Gerald Rabkin, Longman: 2001. FIELDS OF STUDY Major Field: Theatre vi TABLE OF CONTENTS Page Abstract……………………………………………………………………………………………………………………………ii Dedication………………………………………………………………………………………………………………………iv Acknowledgments……………………………………………………………………………………………………………v Vita…………………………………………………………………………………………………………………………………….vi Introduction……………………………………………………………………………………………………………………1 Chapters: 1. God, The Church, and Jurisdiction: Faith and Reason…………………………………………………………………………………………32 2. Fireplace Pokers and Skull Crushers: Autonomy and Responsibility……………………………………………………………63 3. Forces of Nature, The Possibility of Happiness: Humans and Nature………………………………………………………………………………………94 4. Embracing the Cat and Killing the Mother: Individual and Community…………………………………………………………………126 Conclusion……………………………………………………………………………………………………………………158 Appendix A: Play Summaries………………………………………………………………………167 Appendix B: Play Reviews……………………………………………………………………………173 Appendix C: Timeline of Irish History…………………………………………177 Appendix D: Biographical Chronology………………………………………………179 Bibliography………………………………………………………………………………………………………………181 Endnotes…………………………………………………………………………………………………………………………188 vii INTRODUCTION This dissertation investigates the work of the new Irish playwright, Martin McDonagh and where he fits in the rich tradition of Irish drama. It will explore, in depth, each of McDonagh’s five produced plays about Ireland: The Beauty Queen of Leenane, A Skull in Connemara, The Lonesome West, The Cripple of Inishmaan, and The Lieutenant of Inishmore (there is a sixth that completes the Aran Trilogy, The Banshees of Inisheer, that has yet to reach production and a seventh, The Pillowman, currently in production in London that does not directly deal with Ireland).1 By tracing the history of Irish drama from the establishment of the Irish Literary Theatre at the turn of the century to Friel and on to the present, this dissertation demonstrates how McDonagh’s drama offers a new voice for Ireland. While the tradition of Irish drama is rich and includes many playwrights, this dissertation focuses on a few key individuals who laid the groundwork for McDonagh specifically, W. B. Yeats, Lady Gregory, and J. M. Synge 1 and the creation of the Irish National Theatre, as well as the work of Sean O’Casey, Samuel Beckett, and Brian Friel. While each of these playwrights has many plays from which to choose, this study will focus on a handful of “benchmark” plays: Cathleen Ni Houlihan (Yeats and Gregory), Purgatory (Yeats), Riders to the Sea and The Playboy of the Western World (Synge), Juno and the Paycock (O’Casey), Waiting for Godot (Beckett), and Philadelphia, Here I Come! and Dancing at Lughnasa (Friel). In addition, this dissertation explores the notion of Irish identity and what that has meant to other Irish playwrights. In order to explain how McDonagh shatters the myth of Irish identity, it will be necessary to explain how other playwrights viewed this topic. However, this dissertation in no way attempts to explore identity construction in a theoretical sense but only to investigate the ways in which Irish writers of the past have used their literature as tools to unify the nation. It is not the actual construction of identity, but rather, the attempt through art to discover identity, that is the focus of this dissertation. There are many works on the construction of post-colonial national identities, but they are not a focus of this study.2 The 2 issue here is how artists believed they could, as Murray suggests, hold a “mirror up to a nation” and, in turn, tap into a collective unconscious of the Irish soul. This dissertation is a literary, not a critical, analysis of Irish identity. Irish drama can be, and often has been, divided into three parts, or waves. The first wave encompasses the founders of the Irish Literary Theatre as well as the work of such playwrights as O’Casey and Beckett. These writers were revolutionary and writing around the first half of the twentieth century. The second wave involves fewer celebrated playwrights and is most often associated with Friel. Even though there were other playwrights writing in the second half of the twentieth century, Friel has taken his place as the most significant and prolific of these writers. McDonagh and his contemporaries help to make up this third wave of Irish drama, which critics have hailed as the new Irish Renaissance.3 The third wave began, with Anne Devlin in the 1980’s, although her importance has only recently been associated with the new Renaissance. Even though Friel was still writing some of his best plays, Devlin’s presence signaled the beginning of a new 3 voice for Irish women. Continuing in that vein in the 1990’s, Marina Carr came onto the Irish scene and found success. Anne Devlin was born in Belfast, Northern Ireland, to a Catholic family. Her first play performed on stage, Ourselves Alone (1985) received critical acclaim. Her other plays including The Long March, A Woman Calling, and After Easter also deal with the issues of growing up in Northern Ireland as a Catholic and a woman. In Ourselves Alone, the action centers around three women who are sisters, Frieda, Josie, and Donna, and how they cope with the pressure of living with three men who are in the Irish Republican Army (IRA). A feminist look at war, the play also deals with the issue of the war itself. After Easter, which debuted in 1994, focuses on the character of Greta, who has cut herself off from her Irishness and her religion. After a breakdown, Greta is called by visions back to Ireland to confront her identity.