Christmas has inspired personal stories and writings for so
many of Ireland's writers. From playwrights to novelists, the story of
Christmas and what it means, in comedy and tragedy, for so many has resulted in
great works, many of which are within the Archives of the Hardiman Library here
at NUI Galway.
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| Draft of story, Christmas, by John McGahern |
The writer John McGahern explored this particular time of
year in one of his short stories. How that story even came to be is a story in
itself. Christmas is the story of the
young boy deposited to a family at Christmas time from an orphanage. He rejects
a gift he is given, that of a toy aeroplane and this act forms the centre of
McGahern's attention in the drafting of the story. The McGahern Archive
contains numerous drafts of the story which was first published in the Irish Press in 1968. Numerous titles
range from Santa Claus, A Gift for Himself, The Aeroplane, before finally being published as Christmas in the volume of short stories
Nightlines in 1970.
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| Draft of story, Christmas, by John McGahern |
The opening line of many of the drafts begin with "The
thaw overhead in the bear branches had stopped the evening we filled the load
for Mrs. Grey". This would imply that winter has passed and Christmas is
over. Yet the published story opens with a different scene, one of a young boy
being boarded onto a train, described as a "ward of State" and being
sent to live with 'Moran' for the Christmas period. Moran is a recurring name
within McGahern's work, also being the family name within his 1991 novel Amongst Women. The novel itself was
nearly called The Morans, only to be
changed very close to publication.
Given so much effort of redrafting, editing and re-titling
of the story is evident with McGahern's papers, it is clear this particular
story meant quite a deal for the writer in the late 1960s. The variances in
handwriting styles also show the revisions were carried out over a number of
years, as McGahern's hand changed over the years.
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| Cover of A Christmas Carol, Lyric Theatre Archive, 1981 |
Another traditional Christmas tale is that of the Dickens
classic A Christmas Carol. The Lyric
theatre in Belfast staged in 1980 in a version by John Boyd. Boyd was a
prolific playwright during the previous decade of the 1970s, writing some of
the most important plays regarding the ongoing conflict in Northern Ireland
with works such as The Flats in 1972
also presented by the Lyric Theatre. In his introduction to the play, Boyd
writes of Dickens' story being linked to the plight of everyday life in Belfast
at the time. The Lyric theatre founding director, Mary O'Malley, was so
enthused with Christmas-themed drama that one of the very first productions by
the Lyric players was a version of The
Nativity, by Lady Augusta Gregory in November 1950. The script of this had
to be procured from the Gate Theatre, Dublin, as seen in the letter here.
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| Scene from the Nativity by Lady Gregory, Lyric Theatre Archive, 1950 |
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| Letter from Gate Theatre sending script of The Nativity to the Lyric Theatre Lyric Theatre Archive. |
At the Gate Theatre itself, the theatre staged a revival production of Micheál MacLiammóir's Christmas play, Home for Christmas or A Grand Tour. First staged in 1950, in the original programme note, reproduced in the 1976 revival programme, MacLiammóir recounts how he was prompted to write the play by Orsen Wells about an prosperous English family touring across Africa and Europe at a time of Victorian empire and exploration. MacLiammór took that advice but set the story among an wealthy Irish family who are returning from world travels to Ireland for Christmas.
We wish all our readers a very
happy Christmas and best
wishes for 2017!
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