Biography Essay

Brendan Behan was the most important new Irish dramatist of the 1950s. Writing without the support of the theatrical establishment (the Abbey Theatre rejected his early efforts), Behan developed an original style that combined bawdy humor, genuine pathos, and social insight. If he had a model for his role as dramatist, it was probably Sean O'Casey, whom Behan admired both as a playwright and as an opponent of censorship. The major influence on his plays, however, was Joan Littlewood's Theatre Workshop, which emphasized improvisational effects, songs, and contemporary allusions that are supposed to make the play more immediately relevant to an audience. Unfortunately, Behan's dependence on these methods led to such loose structuring of his plays that in his unfinished play, Richard's Cork Leg (1972), songs and joke sequences are substituted for the development of plot, character, and theme. Disappointed at his inability to repeat the success...