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Title Performing Irishness: translations of Irish drama for the Galician stage (1921-2011) Author(s) Serra Porteiro, Elisa Publication date 2015 Original citation Serra Porteiro, E. 2015. Performing Irishness: translations of Irish drama for the Galician stage (1921-2011). PhD Thesis, University College Cork. Type of publication Doctoral thesis Rights © 2015, Elisa Serra Porteiro. http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc-nd/3.0/ Embargo information No embargo required Item downloaded http://hdl.handle.net/10468/2887 from Downloaded on 2017-02-12T06:37:46Z Performing Irishness: Translations of Irish Drama for the Galician Stage (1921-2011) Elisa Serra Porteiro Submitted for the Degree of Doctor of Philosophy to the National University of Ireland, University College Cork Supervisor: Dr Helena Buffery Department of Spanish, Portuguese and Latin American Studies Head of Department: Dr Helena Buffery July 2015 Abstract This PhD thesis provides a detailed analysis of the role and significance of Irish drama in the Galician cultural context, from the early twentieth century onwards, through scrutiny of key works translated, adapted and mediated for the Galician stage. Drawing primarily on the theoretical framework of Descriptive Translation Studies, informed by Polysystems theory (Toury), Post-colonial Translation, research on processes of cultural translation (Bassnett, Lefevere, Venuti, Aaltonen), as well as careful comparative attention to the specificities of literary, theatrical and cultural context, I examine the factors governing the incorporation, reshaping and reception of twentieth century Irish plays in Galicia in order to produce a cultural history of the representation of Ireland on the Galician stage. Focusing on the five key periods I have identified in the translation/reception of Irish drama in Galicia, as represented in specific versions of plays by Yeats, Synge, O’Casey and McDonagh, my thesis examines in detail the particular linguistic, sociopolitical, theatrical and cultural dimensions of each rewriting and/or restaging in order to uncover the ways in which Irish identity is perceived, constructed and performed in a Galician context. Moving beyond the literary, historical and philological focus of existing studies of the reception of Irish literature and foreign dramatic texts in the Galician system, my own approach draws on Theatre and Performance Studies to attend also to the performative dimension of these processes of cultural adaptation and reception, giving full account of the different agents involved in theatre translation as a rich and complex process of multivalent cultural mediation. ii Table of Contents Abstract ii Table of contents iii List of Illustrations vi Declaration vii Acknowledgments viii Introduction 1 Chapter One – Irish Drama and Galician National Identity, 1921-1936 13 1.1. The identification with Ireland and its political utilisation 14 1.2. Galician nationalism and the agents of the incorporations 18 1.3. The debate around theatre practice 25 1.4. Antón Villar Ponte’s Cathleen Ni Houlihan 31 1.4.1. The Revista Nós, frame of the translation 32 1.4.2. Indebted to Manent: the Catalan mediation of Yeats 35 1.5. Setting sights on the stage: O País da saudade 45 1.5.1. Paratextual framing in Dous folk-dramas. 46 1.5.2. Approach to translation and language 51 1.5.3. Translation strategy versus dramaturgical viability 56 1.6. Conclusion 57 Chapter Two – Escenas transterradas: The Translocation of the Galician Stage 60 2.1. The Configuration of the Extraterritorial Context 61 2.1.1. The Galician diaspora in Argentina 62 2.1.2. Cultural activity in the Buenos Aires diaspora 66 2.1.3. The Galician stage in Buenos Aires 68 2.2. Theatrical recovery in Galicia during Franco’s dictatorship 73 2.3. O casamento do latoneiro: A play for the diaspora 80 2.3.1. Documentary traces of the Escola de Teatro Lucense Project 88 2.3.2. Documentary traces of reception and mediation 91 2.3.3. Translation strategies, language and dramaturgical impact 94 2.4. Conclusion 105 iii Chapter Three - Irish Drama in 1970s Galicia: Ditea 107 3.1. Galicia in the 1960s and 1970s: Key political and theatrical aspects 108 3.2.Ditea’s specificity contextualised 112 3.3.Irish drama in the Ditea repertoire 120 3.3.1. Ditea and translation 120 3.3.2. The Irish plays 123 3.3.3. Ditea and the Galician language 130 3.4. Two approaches: Cabalgada cara o mar and Rosas vermellas pra mín 133 3.4.1. Cabalgada cara o mar: Commemoration, language and mediated Irishness 134 3.4.2. Rosas vermellas pra mín: a contextual choice 150 3.5. Conclusion 163 Chapter Four - Irish Drama and the Institutionalisation of Theatre Practice: the Centro Dramático Galego 165 4.1.Theatre as an institution in a minorised context 167 4.1.1. CDG: Foundation and characteristics 167 4.1.2. The role of the CDG: Towards a Galician theatre repertoire 172 4.1.3. The CDG and the Galician language 176 4.2. Appropriating Synge 178 4.2.1. O mozo que chegou de lonxe 180 4.2.2. Como en Irlanda (Xinetes para o mar) 184 4.3. Staging symbolic geographies 192 4.3.1. The Playboy: ‘unha versión brutal’ 192 4.3.2. Riders to the Sea: ‘escolla azarosa’? 205 4.4.Conclusion 211 Chapter Five - Martin McDonagh in the Galician Target System 213 5.1.Contextualising twenty-first century theatre practice in Galicia 214 5.2.The deproblematisation of Martin McDonagh 218 5.3.The Leenane Trilogy on the Galician stage 221 5.3.1. The incorporations: Identification, rurality and genre gap 224 iv 5.3.2. Translation strategies and dramaturgical choices 229 5.4. Conclusion 246 Conclusions 249 APPENDICES 254 Appendix A Review - O casamento do latoneiro 255 Appendix B Ditea Repertoire 257 Appendix C Textual Examples – The Early Yeats Translations 261 Appendix D Textual Examples of Mediation – The Tinker’s Wedding 264 Appendix E Textual Examples of Mediation – Ditea plays 268 Appendix F Textual Examples – O mozo que chegou de lonxe 280 Appendix G Textual Examples – The Leenane Trilogy 283 Appendix H O casamento do latoneiro – Mariví Villaverde’s Script 289 Appendix I O mozo que chegou de lonxe – Manuel Olveira ‘Pico’ and María Bouzas’ Scripts 292 Appendix J Hand programmes – Ditea productions 294 Appendix K Hand programme – O mozo que chegou de lonxe 302 Appendix L Hand programmes – Teatro do Atlántico and Producións Excéntricas 306 Bibliography 312 v List of Illustrations 1. Cover page. Dous folk-dramas (Santiago de Compostela: Nós, 1935) 2. Hand programme. O casamento do latoneiro. 3. Villaverde script, ‘Cantiga galega’. O casamento do latoneiro. 4. Villaverde script, manuscript stage directions. O casamento do latoneiro. 5. O País da saudade, Ditea, 17 May 1977. 6. Rosas vermellas pra mín, Ditea, December 1976. 7. Rosas vermellas pra mín, Ditea, December 1976. 8. Poster. O mozo que chegou de lonxe, CDG, 1988. 9. Poster. Como en Irlanda, CDG, 1996. 10. Poster. A raíña da beleza de Leenane, Teatro do Atlántico, 2006. 11. Poster. Un cranio furado, Producións excéntricas, 2010. 12. Poster. Oeste solitario, Producións excéntricas, 2011. vi Declaration I, Elisa Serra Porteiro, hereby declare that this thesis is the record of my research, that it has been written by me, that all sources are acknowledged, and that it has not been submitted in any previous application for a higher degree. Signed_________________________ Date_______________ vii Acknowledgements This thesis has been completed thanks to scholarships from the Irish Research Council of Ireland and the Department of Spanish, Portuguese and Latin American Studies, University College Cork. The Department has provided an incredibly supportive environment, in every sense, and I could not have wished for a better place to carry out my research. I am indebted to my supervisor, Dr Helena Buffery, for her outstanding professional and personal qualities, her dedication, vision and encouragement. She has been instrumental in bringing this project to life and for that, I thank her wholeheartedly. Every person in the Department has offered helpful advice, practical help and kind words at some point during the last few years and I am truly grateful for that. I would like to thank very specially Eugenia Bolado, Professor Nuala Finnegan, Stephen Boyd, and Dr Martín Veiga. A special mention goes to fellow postgraduates Laura Linares and Dr Donna Alexander, for their friendship and generosity. My gratitude is also to library staff in the Biblioteca de Filoloxía (UDC, A Coruña), the Boole Library, and to Frédéric Antoine (Alliance Française, Dublin), for their readiness to assist with documentary issues. Many of the materials that I used for my research had to be sourced from private archives or personal collections. I owe a great deal to Alberto Álvarez (Ditea), Rubén González (Producións Excéntricas); translators Alberto Avendaño and Manuel Bermúdez Blanco; scholars Carmen Mejía, Inma López Silva, Iolanda Ogando, Noemí Pazó, and Silvia Vázquez Fernández; actresses María Barcala and María Bouzas; directors Quico Cadaval and Xúlio Lago, and to all of the practitioners whose willingness to lend their work to scrutiny has made this project possible. In particular, the collaboration of Avelino González has been absolutely vital and I could never thank him enough. I would like to thank my family and friends, for both their moral and – crucially! – practical support: Kathryn, for her invaluable daily help; my Irish family, the Harringtons; my husband, Ger; and my mother, María Jesús Porteiro. A special thought goes to my mother-in-law, Martina Harrington, whose life was a true inspiration, and to the other ‘product’ of the PhD years, my son Nicolás. I would like to dedicate my work to the memory of my grandparents, Antonio Sierra and Elisa Porteiro. Sempre queridos e admirados, e sempre no recordo. viii Introduction This PhD thesis presents a detailed cultural history of the translation, adaptation and reception of Irish theatre in Galicia that focuses on the specificity of the performance of Irishness on the Galician stage.