O’Casey and An Taibhdhearc

Abstract

Despite the fact that O’Casey took a lively and life-long interest in the Irish language, Gaelicized his name, taught classes in Irish and reverted to the language even in his old age, little is known about the fate of his plays in the original language of his native country. The standard bibliography by Ronald Ayling and Michael J Durkan lists translations of plays by O’Casey into 23 languages, including Estonian, Bulgarian, Slovak, and Persian, but it mentions only one translation into Irish: Aodh MacDhubhain’s version of the short-play A Pound on Demand, Punt at Éileamh.¹ Admittedly there have been far more translations of O’Casey’s works into French, German or Russian than into Gaelic. This is due, in part at least, to the fact that no Gaelic-language theatrical tradition in Ireland existed before the beginning of this century, and even the Irish dramatic movement that resulted in the foundation of the Abbey Theatre did relatively little to promote drama in Irish. Apart from the two pre-Abbey productions of Casadh an tSúgáin (Douglas Hyde) and Eilís agus an Bhean Déiree (Peadar Mac Fhionnlaoich) and the solitary production of Hyde’s An Tincéar agus an tSidheóg (1912) it took the nascent national theatre until 1938 to produce its first play in the first language of the country, and if it had not been for Ernest Blythe’s singlemindedness and his successful policy of producing Christmas pantomimes in Irish, drama in Irish might never have gained a foothold on the professional Dublin stage at all. ²