Abstract
In The Hanging Gardens (2013), the chronicle collapse of retired Irish writer Sam Grant’s into dementia and aphasia seems to leave no room for sublimation and transcendence, let alone any such celebratory utopianism—as has often been claimed to be rooted in Frank McGuinness’s drama. This chapter seeks to illustrate, however, that the Grants negotiate their way, through sheer resilience and creativity, to atheistic tragic transcendence and turn the metaphorical stage space of the family’s ‘hanging gardens’ into relational, absolute space, of which the audience may partake.
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Kolb, M. (2017). From Dementia to Utopia: Tragedy and Transcendence in Frank McGuinness’s The Hanging Gardens . In: Etienne, A., Dubost, T. (eds) Perspectives on Contemporary Irish Theatre. Palgrave Macmillan, Cham. https://doi.org/10.1007/978-3-319-59710-2_3
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DOI: https://doi.org/10.1007/978-3-319-59710-2_3
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