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Stephen McKenna -- actor, retired journalist,
and citizen of Omah, Northern Ireland -- visited campus in
March of this year as a guest lecturer. Mr. McKenna joined
the cast of The Cripple of Inishmaan during
rehearsal to discuss the Irish dialect. Upon returning to
Ireland, he penned this article for McLennan Theatre's virtual
dramaturgy web site, and extended his "good wishes to the
cast and company . . . they will make a good job of it."
The Aran Islands
by Stephen McKenna
Three limestone outcrops dominate the sea
lanes and fisheries of Galway Bay in the west of Ireland.
Although bleak and forbidding, they have been inhabited since
earliest times. In the beginning of the Christian era in Ireland,
great stone forts or 'cashels' were built, one of which, Du'n
Aengus, is remarkably well preserved. This edifice and its
surrounding soutennains and cheveux-de-frise was described
by a late 19th century archaeologist as the greatest example
of a barbarian fortress in Europe.
During the Golden Age of Irish civilization
(in the seventh through tenth centuries AD), when Ireland
was a beacon of light and learning in a continent which had
fallen into darkness, Christian monks built the renowned St.
Endo's Monastery, which provided refuge and solace for scholars
and ascetics from all over Europe.
In the Middle Ages, the islands, because
of their strategic importance, were the source of conflict
between the O'Flahertys of Galway, and the O'Briens of Clane.
In the 1650s the soldiers of Oliver Cromwell's armies conquered
the islands, and soldiers from ranks of those armies were
given grants of land in lieu of wages, and whereas most of
the Cromwellian soldiers paid in this manner soon sold off
the land and went back to England, many on the Aran Islands
were inclined to remain there--hence the persistence of such
un-Irish names as Piggot and Perkins.
In the 19th century the islands attracted
archaeological, ethnographic, and philological interest. The
Irish language remains the mother tongue of the islands to
this day. At the start of the 20th century, the Boans of Works
"restored" many of the ancient, ruined forts. At about the
same time, the dramatist J. M. Synge made several prolonged
visitations to the islands and recorded them in his memoirs,
"A Journey to the Aran Islands." Synge found a civilization
on the rim of Europe, virtually untouched by the political,
technological, or philosophical changes that had affected
the rest of the continent.
In 1932 the documentary director Robert Flaherty
came to the islands to film "Man of Aran." The film was criticized
at the time for being somewhat contrived. It brought great
consciousness of Aran to the outside world. The making of
Flaherty's film provides the background to Martin MacDonach's
play The Cripple of Innishman.
The islands lie 30 miles out in Galway Bay.
Traditionally, transport was provided by currachs, or steamers.
There is now a helicopter and light air service, and the islands
are the beneficiaries of a massive tourism boom, although
many in Aran, and in Ireland as a whole, are concerned that
commercialism and consumerism may undermine the identity,
and integrity, of the little archipelago.
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