O'Casey, Sean
O'Casey, Sean (1880–1964),Irish dramatist and younger rival of William Butler Yeats. O'Casey's career took off with the Abbey Theatre's production of The Shadow of a Gunman (1923), a realistic play about pre‐independence Ireland. With the Silver Tassie (1929), O'Casey began experimenting with expressionism and allegory, but it was not until later in his career that he experimented with fantasy, resulting in Cock‐a‐Doodle Dandy (1949), in which an enchanted cock, whom the village priest believes to be the incarnation of the devil, represents ‘the joyful, active spirit of life’. Figuro in the Night (1961) is a fantasy written in much the same vein.
Anne Duggan
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