Edge Hill University’s Professor Victor Merriman has teamed up with Liverpool Irish Festival to deliver a two events as part of the popular festival.
Friday 24 October 2014, book launch: Eamon Maher and Eugene O’Brien, From prosperity to austerity: A socio-cultural critique of the Celtic Tiger and its aftermath
This new collection of commissioned essays examines both the Irish economic phenomenon known as the Celtic Tiger, and the financial devastation which continues in its wake. It focuses on how these financial developments have been reflected in writing, film and culture in order to offer a more rounded analysis of the effects of this momentous period on people’s lives. The editors have assembled authoritative contributions by internationally acknowledged experts in fields as diverse as religion, literature, popular culture, photography, music, film, theatre, gastronomy, gender, immigration. This collection enriches understandings of its subject which, up until now, has been seen almost exclusively as a matter for economic discourse. Edge Hill’s Professor Victor Merriman contributed a chapter entitled, ‘Holes in the Ground’: theatre as critic and conscience of Celtic Tiger Ireland. Copies of the book will be available at special discounted prices, as follows:
The launch takes place at 6.45 for 7.00, and the guest speaker is Professor Shaun Richards, Professorial Research Fellow in Irish Studies at St Mary’s University College, Twickenham. Professor Richards was a founding member of the British Association of Irish Studies, and is co-author of the seminal text, Writing Ireland: Nationalism, Colonialism and Literature he is co-author of Mapping Irish Theatre: theories of Space and Place.
Commemorating World War I
Silencing Shaw: Censorship, Theatre and World War I
Edge Hill University returns to the Lantern Theatre Liverpool, and the Liverpool Irish Festival. Professor Victor Merriman’s stagings of rehearsed readings of The Star Turns Red and Red Roses for Me by Sean O’Casey, were a considerable success in 2013.
On Friday 24 October, Edge Hill University presents a unique evening of reflection on World War I, focused on Professor Merriman’s staging of Bernard Shaw’s O’Flaherty VC (1915). The one act play’s scheduled Abbey Theatre, Dublin premiere was cancelled, following representations from British Army authorities. The theatre withdrew the play, in light of anxieties that Private O’Flaherty’s view that ‘no war is right’ might hamper efforts to recruit to Irish regiments, and even provoke riots in the streets of Dublin. The script was performed by members of the Royal Flying Corps in Flanders (1917), and had its theatrical premiere in New York, on 21June 1920.
Silencing Shaw: Censorship, Theatre and World War I, is introduced by Dr Lauren Arrington, author of ‘The Censorship of O’Flaherty VC’. The play reading follows, and convivial post-show conversation will be led by Dr Terry Phillips, Liverpool Hope University.
All are welcome to the book launch and wine reception, and tickets for the lecture, play reading and discussion are available here for £5.00.
Monday 27 October – Irish Film Shorts, FACT, Liverpool
Edge Hill University’s Professor Roger Shannon has worked together with the Indie Cork Film Festival to screen, select and curate a number of Irish shorts and animation which will be shown as part of the Liverpool Irish Festival.
Mick Hannigan, Director of the Indie Cork Film Festival, will introduce the screenings. Find out more here.
The Liverpool Irish Festival takes place from 23rd October until 2nd November in venues throughout LIverpool. Find out more here.
