The Irish summer would be much drearier without the mood of joie-de-vivre the arts festivals and summer schools brings to a host of locations around the country. Almost every major city or town now has an event which enlivens, enriches and adds colour to the lives of its inhabitants, attracts visitors and gives a boost to local business and tourist interests.
Quite often such festivals, through their sponsorship arrangements, represent good examples of culture meeting commerce. On Monday one of the longest-established and most highly regarded of these events, the Galway Arts Festival, begins its two-week jamboree.
From the Inishowen Peninsula in Donegal to Boyle in County Roscommon and the medieval city of Kilkenny, audiences will experience a non-stop programme of performance, music, exhibitions, street theatre, literary readings, fleadhs, and other entertainment. Growing numbers of these events embrace and celebrate the much wider cultural diversity of our society. That is to be commended and has to be further encouraged if there is to be a real intertwining of the new and the traditional.
The summer schools - now a distinctive part of what we are - accommodate a national passion for debate, argument and soul-searching, as well as providing a seasonal refuge for politicians and academics who, in July and August, are without their usual platforms. The staying power of schools like the Merriman has been remarkable, and their role in examining national self-image and helping to expand our view of the world is not as much appreciated as it should be.
There is, too, an international dimension to all this: an event like the Yeats International Summer School has a reputation and appeal that reaches far beyond the shores of Sligo Bay. By invoking the names of Hewitt, Stoker or Hopkins these gatherings remind us of Ireland's rich literary heritage. Recent moves to hold a similar gathering for the poet Patrick Kavanagh have merit in recognition of his underestimated artistic achievement.
A look at any of the programmes for these events gives an idea of the vision and flair, imagination and enthusiasm at work in the host communities, often supported by considerable volunteer effort and organisation. Audience development was a key component of cultural strategy in the Arts Council's recently abandoned Arts Plan and must re-emerge as part of the new blueprint which the Council plans to adopt after a period of consultation with the sector.
The festivals, with their multiplicity of artforms, have played a valuable role in this audience expansion and in creating greater local access to the enjoyment of a cultural experience. Their truest function is to serve what seems like an endless capacity to enjoy that almost indefinable phenomenon, the craic.