Metatheatre in Brian Friel’s The Loves of Cass McGuire: The Semiotics of Make-Believe

Abstract

The purpose of the present paper is to explore the metatheatrical techniques in The Loves of Cass McGuire by Brian Friel. Those include the play-within-a-play, expressionism, as well as the self-reflexive techniques of Brecht’s and Pirandello’s metatheatre. In terms of structure, character delineation, language and setting, Cass McGuire draws attention to Friel’s self-conscious devices. The play dramatizes the frustrations of Cass who deliberately chooses to withdraw to the realm of illusions and dreams, after being disappointed at the unpleasant realities she found at home. The study will also show how Friel managed to create a theatricalized balanced frame that draws the audience’s attention to the theatrical devices and structural features of his play on the one hand, and to the reality beyond the theatre, or the world as “a projection of human consciousness”, as Abel asserts, on the other.

Keywords

• Brian Friel
• metatheatre
• semiotics in literature
• Irish theatre
• modern drama