Brian Friel

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Brian Friel

Bernard Patrick "Brian" Friel (born January 9, 1929 in Killyclogher near Omagh , Northern Ireland , † October 2, 2015 in Greencastle , County Donegal ) was an Irish playwright .

Life

Brian Friel was born in 1929 near Omagh, County Tyrone , Northern Ireland. After his parents moved to Derry in 1939 , he attended St. Columb's College and then studied at St. Patrick's Catholic College in Maynooth , where he received his BA in 1948 . However, he decided against the profession of priest and was trained as a teacher from 1949 to 1950 at St. Joseph's Teacher Training College in Belfast . From 1950 to 1960 he worked as a teacher in Derry; During this time his first short stories appeared in the New Yorker and in 1958 his first radio play A Sort of Freedom . In 1954 he married Anne Morrison, with whom he had four daughters and a son. After the New Yorker had published his stories regularly, Friel gave up his activity as a teacher in 1960 to devote himself exclusively to writing. Since 1967 Friel lived in seclusion in the village of Muff not far from Derry in County Donegal in the Republic of Ireland .

plant

Friel's first (unpublished) works were created in the late 1950s and early 1960s. His breakthrough as a playwright came with the play The Enemy Within at the Abbey Theater in Dublin , the international breakthrough with Philadelphia, I'm here! (1964). In his numerous plays, which often deal specifically with Irish subjects but have been translated into several languages, Friel repeatedly addressed the discrepancy between imagination and reality, dream and reality. He was particularly interested in the entanglements and complications that arise from the inability of humans to develop a balanced and appropriate understanding of reality. In Philadelphia, I'm there! he even illustrated the dichotomy of the protagonist between imagination and reality in terms of drama by letting him appear in the form of two different characters. Frial was also called the "Irish Chekhov "; He was fascinated by Chekhov's characters who clung to their certainties even when they knew that their social epoch was doomed and who overcame their problems by talking endlessly about them. He also adapted characters from Chekhov's Three Sisters and Uncle Vanya for his pieces.

Friel's multi-award-winning play Lughnasa - Zeit des Tanzes was filmed in 1998 with Meryl Streep and Michael Gambon . The German title of the film is Tanz in die Freiheit .

The Catholic Friel founded in 1980 together with the Protestant Stephen Rea , the "Field Day Theater Company" in Derry, that of the Northern Ireland conflict wanted to give the city concerned a new basis for the common cultural identification of Catholics and Protestants. The Field Day Theater Company's first production was the premiere of Friels Translations (Speech Disorders) on September 23, 1980. In addition to Stephen Rea, Liam Neeson was also part of the cast.

Honors

Friel had been one of the (then five) Saoithe ("wise men") at Aosdána , the association of Irish artists and writers , since 2006 . In 1987, Friel was nominated Senator in the 18th Seanad Éireann by Taoiseach Charles J. Haughey .

In 1989 BBC Radio ran a six-part series entitled Brian Friel Season dedicated to his work; Friel is the only playwright to date who received such an honor while still alive. In 1996 he was elected as an honorary foreign member of the American Academy of Arts and Letters .

Friel's 70th birthday was celebrated from April to August 1999 with a Friel Festival in Dublin, where ten of his works were performed or presented as dramatic readings. In connection with this festival, a special edition of the Irish University Review was published, dedicated to Friel as a playwright. He also received an award from the Irish Times in 1999 for his lifetime achievement .

Works

  • 1958: This Doubtful Paradise
  • 1962: The Enemy Within
  • 1964: Philadelphia Here I Come! (Philadelphia, I'm here!)
  • 1967: Lovers
  • 1968: Crystal and Fox
  • 1973: The Freedom of the City
  • 1975: Volunteers
  • 1977: Living Quarters
  • 1979: Aristocrats
  • 1980: Faith Healer (The Faith Healer )
  • 1980: Translations (language disorders)
  • 1981: Three Sisters , an adaptation by Anton Pawlowitsch Chekhov
  • 1982: The Communication Cord (Die Notbremse)
  • 1989: Making History
  • 1990: Dancing at Lughnasa (Lughnasa - Time of Dance)
  • 1992: A Month in the Country , an adaptation by Ivan Sergejewitsch Turgenew
  • 1993: Wonderful Tennessee
  • 1995: Molly Sweeney
  • 1997: Give Me Your Answer, Do!
  • 1998: Uncle Vanya , an adaptation by Anton Pavlovich Chekhov
  • 2001: The Yalta Game , an adaptation by Anton Pavlovich Chekhov
  • 2002: The Bear , an adaptation by Anton Pavlovich Chekhov
  • 2003: Performances
  • 2005: The Home Place
  • 2008: Hedda Gabler , an adaptation by Henrik Ibsen

literature

  • Tony Coult: About Friel: the Playwright and the Work. Faber & Faber, London 2003, ISBN 0-571-20164-4
  • Jochen Achilles: "Philadelphia, here I come!" In: Martha Kleinhans, Klaus Stierstorfer (Hrsg.): Readings for the 21st century. Key texts in European literature: England, France, Ireland, Italy, Portugal, Russia. Königshausen & Neumann , Würzburg, 2001, ISBN 3-8260-1944-X , pp. 1–26.
  • Jochen Achilles, Rüdiger Imhof: Achilles' Art . In: Jochen Achilles, Rüdiger Imhof (ed.): Irish dramatists of the present. WBG , Darmstadt 1996, ISBN 3-534-12656-4 , pp. 38-55
  • Geraldine Higgins: Brian Friel . Northcote House, Tavistock 2010, ISBN 978-0-7463-1130-1
  • Walter T. Rix: Reflections on the Northern Ireland Conflict: The Irish Drama as a Forum for Current Affairs (Brian Friel: The Freedom of the City. 1974). In: Horst Groene, Berthold Schik (Hrsg.): The modern drama in English lessons in upper secondary level, fundamentals, interpretations, course projects . Scriptor Verlag, Königstein / Ts. 1980, ISBN 3-589-20743-4 , pp. 77-98
  • Jessica Adolf: Éire mar a bhí. Staging Irish Identities in the Theater of Brian Friel . Scientific publishing house Trier 2015, ISBN 978-3-86821-615-8

Web links

Individual evidence

  1. ↑ Dramatist Brian Friel has died aged 86 . Raidió Teilifís Éireann , October 2, 2015.
    Rachel Flaherty: Irish playwright Brian Friel dies aged 86 . The Irish Times , October 2, 2015.
  2. ↑ Cf. Walter T. Rix: Reflexionen des Nordirlandkonfliks , p. 95, as well as the information in Enzyclopaedia Britannica (cf. web link below).
  3. ^ Walter T. Rix: Reflections of the Northern Ireland Conflict , p. 81
  4. ^ Benedict Nightingale: Brian Friel, Playwright Called the Irish Chekhov, Dies at 86 , in: New York Times , October 2, 2015.
  5. ↑ Biographical entry in Aosdána , accessed on October 2, 2015.
    Saoithe in Aosdána , accessed on October 2, 2015.
  6. ^ Honorary Members: Brian Friel. American Academy of Arts and Letters, accessed March 10, 2019 .
  7. ↑ Lecture series at the University of Würzburg 2000. With an illustration Friels. This lecture can be read online at Google books .
personal data
SURNAME Friel, Brian
ALTERNATIVE NAMES Friel, Bernard Patrick (full name)
BRIEF DESCRIPTION Irish playwright
DATE OF BIRTH January 9, 1929
PLACE OF BIRTH Killyclogher , Northern Ireland
DATE OF DEATH October 2nd, 2015
Place of death Greencastle , Ireland