ABSTRACT
This chapter explores Vichian themes in political theatre. It examines Brian Friel's seminal play, Translations, to trace the relationship between Irish theatre and the language of Irish anticolonialism. Giambattista Vico's philological project focused on the historical use of language is nothing less than a Herculean venture. It elevates oral linguistic expression as sites of human labour and striving. It is Vico, more than Spinoza and prior to Marx, who re-inscribes the human subject within materialist philosophy as an agent of historical transformation. In the parlance of Vico's New Science, such poetic knowledge is crucial for determining the scope of human agency. The chapter argues that Translations foregrounds the Vichian humanist struggle over language, as well as the struggle within language: to be immediately relevant, to fulfil its specific function of collective self-expression, and to resist becoming artificial. Translations uses tragedy as entropic form: marking the passing of a social order while releasing the necessary energy for myriad other possibilities.
