Tuesday, September 15, 2015 - 12:30
Music, art and creative writing embody vital elements of the rich association between Ireland and France and a new peer-reviewed collection provides a tantalising selection of their reciprocal influences across the arts. France and Ireland: Notes and Narratives, edited by Una Hunt & Mary Pierse (Bern: Peter Lang, 2015), paints a vivid picture of interrelationships between composers, performers, poets and novelists on both sides of the Celtic Sea.
The book features a chapter by Maynooth lecturer Dr Laura Watson. She examines images of Ireland as evoked in the art music of Third Republic France (c.1870 – 1940), with particular focus on the production and critical reception of the Henri Rabaud opera L’Appel de la mer(1924). Rabaud’s opera is based on the play Riders to the Sea by the Irish author John Millington Synge and engages closely with Synge’s portrayal of the Aran Islands through references to Irish musical traditions. Dr Watson’s chapter also discusses other French musical precedents to Rabaud’s ‘Irish opera’ and situates these against the backdrop of French cultural politics in this period. She further considers how French composers’ notions of Ireland evolved as the political situation in Ireland developed in the early twentieth century.
The book may be purchased here: http://www.peterlang.com/index.cfm?event=cmp.ccc.seitenstruktur.detailseiten&seitentyp=produkt&pk=85985&concordeid=431914