Research Fellow in the Centre for Irish Studies at St Mary’s University, Twickenham Dr Keith Hopper, has been invited to give a guest lecture at Sligo Institute of Technology, Ireland, at the end of Easter. The talk, which is entitled Waiting for Dermot: Dermot Healy’s Collected Plays, will be delivered to the Institute’s Performing Arts students.
The lecture is part of a series of forthcoming events to help mark the publication of four books by and about the late Dermot Healy (1947-2014), which are co-edited by Dr Hopper and Prof Neil Murphy: The Collected Short Stories and an edited reprint of Healy’s debut novel Fighting with Shadows were published in October 2015; The Collected Plays and a volume of critical essays entitled Writing the Sky: Observations and Essays on Dermot Healy, will be published this July.
Dr Hopper said, “Although Dermot Healy is probably best known as an award-winning novelist and poet, he was also a prolific playwright, screenwriter, and actor. Healy’s interest in drama was long-standing, and was central to his development as a writer. Between 1985 and 2010 he wrote thirteen stage plays, all of which are gathered together for the first time in this new volume. Although the settings of Healy’s plays are often local and regional by design, their reach is always international and their themes are universal. In this respect, the publication of The Collected Plays should be of interest not just to scholars and devotees of Irish theatre, but to all practitioners of contemporary drama.”
—Dr Keith Hopper teaches Literature and Film Studies for Oxford University’s Department for Continuing Education, and is a Research Fellow in the Centre for Irish Studies at St Mary’s University, Twickenham. He is the author of Flann O’Brien: A Portrait of the Artist as a Young Post-modernist (revised edition 2009) and general editor of the twelve-volume Ireland into Film series (2001–2007). He is also the co-editor (with Neil Murphy) of Flann O’Brien: Centenary Essays (Dalkey Archive Press, 2011) and The Short Fiction of Flann O’Brien (Dalkey Archive Press, 2013).
Dr Hopper said, “Although Dermot Healy is probably best known as an award-winning novelist and poet, he was also a prolific playwright, screenwriter, and actor. Healy’s interest in drama was long-standing, and was central to his development as a writer. Between 1985 and 2010 he wrote thirteen stage plays, all of which are gathered together for the first time in this new volume. Although the settings of Healy’s plays are often local and regional by design, their reach is always international and their themes are universal. In this respect, the publication of The Collected Plays should be of interest not just to scholars and devotees of Irish theatre, but to all practitioners of contemporary drama.”
—Dr Keith Hopper teaches Literature and Film Studies for Oxford University’s Department for Continuing Education, and is a Research Fellow in the Centre for Irish Studies at St Mary’s University, Twickenham. He is the author of Flann O’Brien: A Portrait of the Artist as a Young Post-modernist (revised edition 2009) and general editor of the twelve-volume Ireland into Film series (2001–2007). He is also the co-editor (with Neil Murphy) of Flann O’Brien: Centenary Essays (Dalkey Archive Press, 2011) and The Short Fiction of Flann O’Brien (Dalkey Archive Press, 2013).Media enquiries
Press team
020 8240 8262