Theatre in Ireland - Mid 20th Century

Mid 20th Century

The twentieth century saw a number of Irish playwrights come to prominence. Samuel Beckett is probably the most significant of these. Beckett had a long career as a novelist and poet before his first play, Waiting for Godot (1953) made him famous. This play, along with his second, Endgame, is one of the great works of absurdist theatre. Beckett was awarded for the Nobel Prize in 1969.

The Lyric Theatre, founded in 1944 by Austin Clarke was based in the Abbey until 1951 and produced many of Clarke's own verse plays. From the mid-1950s, the Unitarian Church at St Stephen's Green, Dublin was home to Amharclann an Damer/The Damer Theatre. The Damer produced both professional and amateur Irish language theatre. The world premier of Brendan Behan's An Giall (The Hostage) took place here in 1958. The theatre closed in 1976. Behan went on to be an extremely popular dramatist, particularly through his work with Joan Littlewood's Theatre Royal in Stratford, East London.

Other important Irish dramatists of this period include: Denis Johnston, Thomas Kilroy, Tom Murphy, Hugh Leonard, Frank McGuinness,and John B. Keane.