Irish Plays and Playwrights | Page 2

she said of the
Renaissance was, "A very large proportion of the Bodley Head poets
are Celts,--Irish, Welsh, Cornish." She had scarcely so spoken when
there appeared the little volume, "The Revival of Irish Literature,"
whose chapters, reprinted addresses delivered before she had spoken by
Sir Charles Gavan Duffy and Dr. George Sigerson and; Dr. Douglas
Hyde, turned the attention of the younger men to literature, the fall of
Parnell and the ensuing decline of political agitation having given them
a chance to think of something else than politics. In 1895 all the
English-speaking world that heeds letters was talking of the Celtic
Renaissance, so quickly did news of it find its way to men, when it was
once more than whispered of abroad. It was as frequently referred to
then as "The Irish Renaissance," because Ireland contributed most to it
and because it was in Ireland that it acquired its most definite purpose.
This purpose was to retell in English the old Irish legends and the still
current Irish folk-songs, and to catch and preserve the moods of Irish
men and women of to-day, especially those moods which came to them
out of their brooding over Ireland, its history, its landscape, the temper
of its people. It would be absurd, of course, to regard all of the writing
of the movement as a result of a definite literary propaganda, but the
very fact that we instinctively speak of the Celtic Renaissance as a
movement rather than as a phenomenon proves that it was that in part.
But even that part of it that was a result of propaganda came not from
an intention to realize the tenets of the propaganda, but from the
kindling of Irish hearts by thoughts that came of the propaganda,
thoughts of the great past of Ireland, of its romance of yesterday and

to-day, of its spirituality.
It is not so easy to account for the less quickening of the other Celtic
countries by the forces that brought about the Renaissance. Renan, in
his "Poetry of the Celtic Races" (1859), and Arnold, in his "On the
Study of Celtic Literature" (1867), had roused all the Celtic countries to
an interest in their old literature, an interest that extended much further
than discussion of the authenticity of Macpherson's "Ossian" or of the
proper treatment of Arthurian stories, until then the Ultima Thule of
talk on things Celtic. Frenchman and Englishman both had spoken to
Wales and Brittany, the Highlands of Scotland and the Isle of Man, as
well as to Ireland, and it does not altogether explain to say that Ireland
listened best because in Ireland there was a greater sense of nationality
than in these other lands. Ireland did listen, it is true, and, listening,
developed popularizers of the old tales such as Mr. Standish James
O'Grady and Dr. P.W. Joyce, to pass knowledge of them along to the
men of letters. It is hardly true, indeed, to say that Ireland had a greater
sense of nationality than Brittany or Wales. Brittany, of course, since
her tongue other than her native Breton was French, gave what was
given to the movement in other than Breton in French. Cornwall may
hardly be called a Celtic country, but if it may it is easy to account for
its slight interest in the movement by the little that was preserved of its
old literature and by the little it had of distinctive oral tradition to draw
upon. And yet, I think, had Sir Arthur T. Quiller-Couch been born ten
years later Cornwall had not wanted a shanachie. Wales, too, gave little
to English literature as the result of the Renaissance, because, perhaps,
her chiefest literary energy is in her native language. Wales was proud
of George Meredith, whose Welsh ancestry is more evident in his work
than is his Irish ancestry, but not only is his writing representative of
Great Britain rather than of any one part of Great Britain, but his say
had been said before the movement began. The writing of Mr. Ernest
Rhys underwent a change because of his interest in the Celtic
Renaissance, but Wales has little writing outside of his to point to as a
result of the awakening. In Scotland, William Sharp, whose "Lyra
Celtica" (1896) was a prominent agent in bringing the Renaissance
before the world, was transformed into another writer by it. His work as
"Fiona Macleod," both prose and verse, was very different from his

earlier work in prose and verse. Mr. Neil Munro, too, was affected by
the Renaissance, and in the tales of "The Lost Pibroch" (1896) and in
the novels of "John Splendid" (1898) and "Gillian the Dreamer" (1899)
and "The Children of Tempest" (1903) he reveals an intimacy with
Highland life such as informs the writing of