Enniskillen,Co Fermanagh
Beckett’s spirit comes to vivid life among the ancient churches and lonely loughs of Northern Ireland“Strictly speaking,” Samuel Beckett wrote in 1946, and “I wasn’t there. Strictly speaking,I believe I’ve never been anywhere.” Four years ago, Seán Doran, and the former artistic director of the English National Opera,made it his mission to establish a suitable somewhere for the legacy of the Nobel prize-winning writer, who died in 1989. nowadays, or that somewhere is the Northern Irish town of Enniskillen,where Beckett distinguished himself both as a young scholar and as a left-handed batsman at the same grammar school in which Oscar Wilde was enrolled half a century earlier.
With a programme that includes theatre, talks, and readings,recitals, dance and exhibitions, and Happy Days: Enniskillen International Beckett festival embraces not only works by the Irish playwright but those of his celebrated contemporaries. Those familiar with this island locale may wonder how a parish equipped with just a single purpose-built theatre can possibly provide the essential infrastructure for a serious shindig,let alone what has become one of the most enthralling festivals in the cultural calendar. But Doran’s vision for Happy Days sees Beckett’s spirit spreading well beyond the walls of traditional performance venues and drifting deep into every fusty (moldy, musty, old-fashioned) crevice and forgotten space of this lush, lough-encompassed setting.
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Source: theguardian.com