At the end of the 1940s, individuals and groups, as well as the government in Ireland, recognized the need for and benefits of arts enterprises. The Inter-Party coalition, which came to power in early 1948 (under John Costello), recognized the importance of tourism as an industry and the potential of theatre to attract foreign visitors to Ireland. In 1949, the Cultural Relations Committee of Ireland, operating under the auspices of the Minister for External Affairs, undertook production of a series of pamphlets designed “to give a broad, vivid, and informed survey of Irish life and culture.”1 In 1951, the Republic of Ireland established the Arts Council; the first National Fleadh (Festival) for traditional music was held in Mullingar; Liam Miller founded the Dolmen Press; and Comhaltas Ceoltoiri Eireann (Traditional Irish Music Advisory) was established. Even after the 1951 election returned de Valera and Fianna Fáil to power, organizational infrastructures to support the arts continued to appear: the Irish tourist board (Bord Failte) and Gael-Linn (an organization to promote Irish language, literature, and culture) both debuted in 1952. Cork held its first International Choral and Folk Dance Festival and its first International Film Festival in 1953. Some of these developments may have anticipated the imminent inauguration of regular air passenger service to North America, but all responded to cultural opportunities precluded during what Ireland knows as the Emergency and other nations as World War II. These agencies and events all sought to project a positive, progressive image of Ireland. Most important, they all mark a departure from the isolationism that prevailed in Ireland before and during the Emergency and that characterized de Valera's tenure as Taoiseach in the 1930s and 1940s.
PETER SHAFFER'S The Royal Hunt of the Sun (1964) and Equus (1973) were both produced by the National Theatre Company; they enjoyed even greater critical and commercial acclaim than his earlier successes. The Battle of Shrivings, however, received almost unanimous scorn from the London critics when it was produced at the Lyric Theatre in February 1970. While The Royal Hunt of the Sun and Equus were hailed for their spectacular dramaturgy, The Battle of Shrivings was seen as a retreat to the comfortable ease of the well-made plot and the domestic setting which worked effectively in Five Finger Exercise (1958) and Black Comedy (1967). Shaffer has since returned to the play, rewriting it as Shrivings (1974). In its present form, Shrivings demonstrates more significant affinities with The Royal Hunt of the Sun and Equus than with his earlier works. These three plays, his most recent full-length dramas, form an impressive triad in which Shaffer recurrently employs certain themes, techniques of characterization, and motifs. They are best considered complementary pieces, shedding and reflecting light upon one another. All three portray a middle-aged man in a crisis of faith: Pizarro and Martin Ruiz in The Royal Hunt oj the Sun, Martin Dysart in Equus, and Mark Askelon in Shrivings all experience profound dissatisfaction with their cultures and their very existences. For each of them, contact with a primitive and vital culture exacerbates this crisis of faith and fuels their need for belief. Though Shaffer's dramatic techniques vary widely among these plays, his most important themes and character types appear with considerable regularity. The failure of modern society to provide a constructive vehicle for man's religious impulses and need for ritualistic worship, the decrepitude of Western religion, and the resultant fragmentation of personality form an important thematic nexus among Shaffer's recent works.
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