When Then is Now
Three Greek Tragedies
Brendan Kennelly

When Then Is Now brings together Brendan Kennelly’s modern versions of three Greek tragedies - Euripides’ The Trojan Women, Euripides’ Medea, and Sophocles’ Antigone. All three plays dramatize timeless human dilemmas as relevant now as they were in ancient times. All focus on women whose lives are torn apart by war, family conflict and despotic regimes. In his preface, Brendan Kennelly describes how writing these three plays helped him enormously at difficult times in his own life.

Of Kennelly’s past works:
“Not since Joyce has an Irish author so captured the soul of Dublin and thereby of Ireland.” —Booklist

“Kennelly never seems to have been afraid of big subjects, big problems.”—Harvard Review

2007, 5½ x 8½, 208 pages (Bloodaxe)
ISBN 978-1-85224-743-0 (1-85224-743-6) Paper $27.95

Ireland on Stage
Beckett and After
Edited by Hiroko Mikami

This collection focuses primarily on Irish playwrights and their works, both in text and on stage during the latter half of the twentieth century. The central figure is Samuel Beckett, whom the contributors use as a springboard to discuss contemporary playwrights such as Brian Friel, Frank McGuinness, Marina Carr, and Conor McPherson, amongst others.

October 2007, 5 x 8, 168 pages (Carysfort)
ISBN 978-1-904505-23-5 (1-904505-23-6) Paper $35.95

Irish Moves
An Illustrated History of Dance
and Physical Theatre in Ireland
Deidre Mulrooney

From Ninette de Valois to Jean Butler and Tom Hickey, this book showcases the stories of Ireland’s unsung movers: actors, dancers, choreographers, playwrights, directors, and the few academics who dare to go where no words have gone before. Focusing on people who value what’s in between the words as much as the words themselves, it features stories of the creative journeys taken by artists who have devoted their lives to physical expression.
Irish Moves not only provides a map of dance and physical theatre in Ireland, but is also a meditation on the complicated attitude the nation has about the body. It offers surprising and sometimes disconcerting revelations about Irish society. But this is no dry history: this is a beautiful book, full of pictures and highly visual, in keeping with the usually word-less subject matter.

2006, 7 x 9½, 320 pages (Liffey)
ISBN 1-904148-92-1 (978-1-904148-92-0) Paper $29.95

The third volume in the Stage by Stage series resumes the narrative after the disappearance of Greek and Roman drama in the turbulent first centuries of the Christian epoch. It traces the return of religious theatre and ritual, with Passion Plays, Mysteries and Moralities taking over from classical drama while folk farce flourishes throughout the Middle Ages. Starting in Italy with the revival of classical works, the Renaissance produces whimsical new dramatic forms including commedia dell’arte, as well as exalted musical innovations culminating in resplendent operas and opulent ballets. The author gives a detailed summary of Shakespeare’s plays and how they have been interpreted through the centuries since their first performance.

Of Freund’s earlier work in the Stage By Stage series:

“Excellent coverage of modern productions
of ancient plays.”—Publishers Weekly

“The writing is clear and lively.”—Library Journal

2006, 7½ x 9¾, 928 pages (Peter Owen)
ISBN 0-7206-1245-4 Cloth $99.95 xCan