TCD Celebrates Synge Centenary with a Symposium, a Collection of Synge’s Travel Writings and an Exhibition of Photographs

Posted on: 27 March 2009

John Millington Synge died on  March 24th,  1909 at the age of just 37, having already established himself as the first major dramatist of the Irish national theatre movement, with plays that were controversial but internationally acclaimed.  Trinity College, where Synge graduated in 1892, and where he learned the Irish language which was so important to his career as a writer, is commemorating the centenary of his death with a series of celebrations this week. They include:

• an international  interdisciplinary symposium on Synge and Edwardian Ireland ;
• the launch of a new collection of his travel writings; 
• an exhibition of Synge’s photographs and manuscripts in the Library; 
• the re-naming of a lecture theatre in his memory.

Synge’s short career as a mature writer almost exactly coincided with the reign of Edward VII (1901-1910).  The period of Edwardian Ireland, and Synge’s role within it, will be explored by specialists in literature, history, art, theatre and music, including Nicola Gordon Bowe, Terence Brown, David Fitzpatrick, Anne Fogarty, Adrian Frazier, Declan Kiberd, W.J. Mc Cormack, Lucy McDiarmid, Anthony Roche, Harry White in the symposium, ‘Synge and Edwardian Ireland’ on  March 26-27th.

What is at present the Ernest Walton Theatre in the Arts Building of the College will become the J.M. Synge Theatre, Ernest Walton, Ireland’s only Nobel Laureate in Science, henceforward giving his name to a new lecture theatre in the   Faculty of Engineering, Mathematics and Science of the College. Marie Mullen, the greatest Synge actress of her generation performed the dedication ceremony on Thursday 26th,  March.

Though Synge is best known as a playwright, he was an accomplished travel writer as well.  In ‘Travelling Ireland: Essays 1898-1908’, veteran Synge scholar Nicholas Grene has collected for the first time all of Synge’s travel essays published in his lifetime in their original form including the original illustrations, most of them by Jack B. Yeats.  This volume was launched following the re-naming of the lecture theatre ceremony, in the Long Room, the Old Library in Trinity. 

Supplementing the book, also in the Long Room, from March 26th, is the exhibition of manuscripts and photographs, ‘John Millington Synge (1871-1909): a traveller in his own land’.

John Millington Synge