Brian Friel and America

Brian Friel and America is the first book-length study to explore Irish playwright Brian Friel through an American lens. By examining Friel's depiction of Irish-American immigrants, his stylistic and thematic similarities to American dramatists Thornton Wilder and Tennessee Williams, his American academic characters, his frequent use of American music, and his evocative portrayal of America as villain, Maria Szasz considers how Friel's perspective towards America has changed during his over forty-year playwriting career. The final aspect of Szasz's American lens closely analyzes the U.S. reception of Friel's plays. Szasz carefully debates the reasons behind Friel's triumphs and failures on and Off Broadway. With a foreword by Professor Christopher Murray of University College Dublin, in essence, Brian Friel and America unravels the complexities of meaning America has had for Friel.