Language and Reconciliation: The Mapping of Ireland and Brian Friel's Drama Translations

Brian Friel’s Translations, first staged in 1980, is one of Ireland’s best-known plays. Its major theme is the language question, and the role of the 19th-century Ordnance Survey in the decline of the Irish language and what the author described as a country being ‘rechristened’.

However, another major theme is language and reconciliation, which is articulated through the love affair of two of the play’s characters and draws on place names in Donegal and Norfolk. This lecture discusses this topic in national, as well as broader international contexts.