On the Town: Lovers of Synge came from as far away as Trinidad to attend the opening of DruidSynge, the production of six plays by John Millington Synge by the Druid theatre company, at the Olympia Theatre in Dublin this week.
Synge is "iconoclastic and anti-authoritarian," said Dr Tony Roche, of UCD's Anglo-Irish Literature and Drama department, and director of the Synge Summer School. His plays are still "so fresh, it still has a tonic effect. He's got a potency because he is so radical and individualistic in his views."
"I wouldn't have missed it for anything," said Katharine Worth, professor emeritus of the University of London at the Royal Holloway College, who came to Dublin especially to see the Druid productions. "I love the way he gets into the heart of the people, and the humour is so rich, and yet he embraces alarming views of what people can do, and there's always the sense of the possibility for keeping the values of love and friendship."
Dr Jean Antoine Dunne, a lecturer in Modernism at the University of the West Indies in Trinidad, said she did her MA on Synge, comparing his use of dialect with the Afro-Caribbean poet, Kamau Barath-Waite. She was at the Olympia on Wednesday night with her daughters, Eileen and Naomi Dunne, her son, Anthony Dunne, and her sister-in-law, Patsy Dunne from Tallaght. Michelle O'Riordan, from Cork, saw parallels between The Well of the Saints and Waiting for Godot in the "existential dilemma" of the characters.
DruidSynge runs at the Olympia Theatre, Dame Street until Sat, Aug 20