| This thesis is an analysis of Brian Friel's play Dancing At Lughnasa, with specific reference to the carnivalesque element as it manifests itself in the play's dramaturgical and thematic composition. The introductory chapter traces the history of the practices of Carnival as they emanated from the seasonal fertility rites of various ancient cultures--all of which were assimilated by Christianity at a later date. It further identifies Mikhail Bakhtin as the twentieth century critic who designated the term "carnivalized literature" which draws on the actual occasions of revelry for its composition, but is also recognized as an entity within itself. Bakhtin's Carnival vocabulary ("crowning/uncrowning", "second life", "transformation downward") is applied firstly to the Irish Literary Renaissance (1898-1926) as the mainspring from which the tradition of Dancing is derived. The terms are subsequently applied to four selected plays of Friel between 1963 and 1987 and the context of Carnival is investigated in each play with respect to a dramaturgy that, as it becomes increasingly more diversified and complex, evolves from the verbal to the preverbal and visual.;Dancing At Lughnasa's presentational/representational structure is perceived as one which alternately engages and alienates the audience. The play is viewed as a dramaturgical culmination and a thematic departure with respect to Friel's prior works. A highly evolved, festive, multifaceted dramaturgy (form) explores the nature of ritual and celebration (content). The character of the priest in this play is seen as Friel's resolution to the tension between the official and the unofficial--a continual preoccupation in his former works. Conversely the social, economic and political status of women emerges as an entirely new topic--one which is shown to be intrinsic to the notion of Carnival. The thesis concludes that the play is carnivalesque as to both form and structure but that revolution in the lives of the particular characters (the story) does not emerge from this marriage. Dance/music as a metaphor for the underlying dynamics between/among the Irish characters addresses the other themes of failure, unfulfillment, powerlessness, but in so doing it equally addresses the possibility of community and empowerment. The "international" or "universal" appeal of this particular play is thus ascribed to the vocabulary of the dance (movement) as one which precedes the parameters of any specific culture, Irish, African or whatever. The thesis finally concludes that this ambiguity of interpretation is integral to the notion of Carnival, which by definition concerns itself with the process of replacing, the refusal to concur with any fixed authority, the eternal question, rather than suggesting any definitive answer. |
