By The Bog Of Cats

Set in the mysterious landscape of the bogs of rural Ireland, Carr's lyrical and timeless play tells the story of Hester Swane, an Irish traveller with a deep and unearthly connection to her land. Tormented by the memory of a mother who deserted her, Hester is once again betrayed, this time by the father of her child, the man she loves. On the brink of despair, she embarks on a terrible journey of vengeance as the secrets of her tangled history are revealed. 'A piece of poetic realism steeped in the past... Carr has an extraordinary ability to move between the mythic and the real.' Guardian 'A great play... a great work of poetry... the word should soon carry across both sides of the Atlantic.' Independent By the Bog of Cats premiered at the Abbey Theatre, Dublin, in 1998. It was revived at Wyndham's Theatre, London, in November 2004.

Shows how contemporary adaptations, on the stage and on the page, can breathe new life into Greek tragedy.

Encounters in Greek and Irish Literature brings together literary experts in two traditions and some contemporary novelists writing in them: this distinctive group includes Katy Hayes, Mia Gallagher, Deirdre Madden, Paraic O’Donnell, Christos Chrissopoulos, Panos Karnezis, Sophia Nikolaidou, and Ersi Sotiropoulos. Their work is presented in context, not only through excerpts from published and unpublished fiction, but also through eight self-reflective essays that enhance our understanding of these authors’ themes and modes. All these critical texts originate from a unique gathering of scholars and creative talent held at the Ionian University, Corfu, in October 2017, predominantly exploring Greek and Irish prose writing and the relationships between them. This volume paints a more complete picture through added scenes from drama, poetry and translation, and through considerations of the history and associations of two literatures at the edges of Europe. Translation is integral to the dialogues fostered; the selected works by the Irish and Greek writers can be read in both Greek and English, a manifestation of, and a further point in, the reception of these authors beyond Greece and Ireland. The book opens with a comprehensive introductory essay by Joanna Kruczkowska, and further insights into the creative mind and aspects of publishing are provided through a roundtable with the authors recorded at the time of the festival. This material further contributes to a remarkably structured look at the business of writing and the workings of two literary systems.

This book locates the theatre of Marina Carr within a female genealogy that revises the patriarchal origins of modern Irish drama. The creative vision of Lady Augusta Gregory underpins the analysis of Carr’s dramatic vision throughout the volume in order to re-situate the woman artist as central to Irish theatre. For Carr, ‘writing is more about the things you cannot understand than the things you can’, and her evocation of ‘pastures of the unknown’ forms the thematic through-line of this work. Lady Gregory’s plays offer an intuitive lineage with Carr which can be identified in their use of language, myth, landscape, women, the transformative power of storytelling and infinite energies of nature and the Otherworld. This book reconnects the severed bridge between Carr and Gregory in order to acknowledge a foundational status for all women in Irish theatre.

This two-volume edited collection illuminates the valuable counter-canon of Irish women’s playwriting with forty-two essays written by leading and emerging Irish theatre scholars and practitioners. Covering three hundred years of Irish theatre history from 1716 to 2016, it is the most comprehensive study of plays written by Irish women to date. These short essays provide both a valuable introduction and innovative analysis of key playtexts, bringing renewed attention to scripts and writers that continue to be under-represented in theatre criticism and performance. Volume Two contains chapters focused on plays by sixteen Irish women playwrights produced between 1992 and 2016, highlighting the explosion of new work by contemporary writers. The plays in this volume explore women’s experiences at the intersections of class, sexuality, disability, and ethnicity, pushing at the boundaries of how we define not only Irish theatre, but Irish identity more broadly. CONTRIBUTORS: Nelson Barre, Mary Burke, David Clare, Shonagh Hill, Mária Kurdi, José Lanters, Fiona McDonagh, Dorothy Morrissey, Justine Nakase, Brian Ó Conchubhair, Brenda O'Connell, Shane O'Neill, Graham Price, Siobhán Purcell, Carole Quigley, Sarah Jane Scaife, Melissa Sihra, Clare Wallace

"Paradise Glossed" is a collection of poems, a diary in rhyme - and a Bristolian book by a Bristolian author. It was written over the course of twelve months at a very specific point in Britain's history - the "fag-end of New Labour", and the height of the modern technological age. Desperately seeking the chinks of light amidst the 21st Century gloom of 'X-Factor' culture, social networking, mobile texting and super-rich corporations, the author has a ball in letting off steam via this crazy log in which, it seems, no-one or nothing is safe - the Royal family, Prime-Ministers, "The Matthew", mobile phones, balloons, Simon Cowell (?) Drawing on topical and historical themes, and with a strong local flavour throughout, "Paradise Glossed" is the author's humorous take on an historic and infamous twelve months set between May 2009 and April 2010, which began with the MP's expenses scandal and ended with us nervously awaiting the result of the General Election......

The first collection of plays by Marina Carr introduces the work of a major new voice in playwriting. Low in the Dark 'One of the most exciting, new and absolutely original aspects of Carr's writing is the manner in which the sexism of the language and religious imagery is exposed... Marina Carr is a playwright to be watched.' Sunday Tribune The Mai 'The writing is at once gentle and raucous... capable of articulating deep-seated woes and resentments in a manner you rarely find outside Eugene O'Neill.' Observer Portia Coughlan 'A play of precocious maturity and accomplishment.' Irish Times ' Portia Coughlan packs a hell of a punch. It hurts to look at it. But it has to be seen.' Irish Independent By the Bog of Cats... 'A poetic realism steeped in the past... Carr has an extraordinary ability to move between the mythic and the real.' Guardian 'A great play... a great work of poetry... the word should soon carry across both sides of the Atlantic.' Independent

Irish culture is obsessed with the past, and this book asks why and how. In an innovative reading of Irish culture since 1980, Emilie Pine provides a new analysis of theatre, film, television, memoir and art, and interrogates the anti-nostalgia that characterizes so much of contemporary Irish culture.