Edward Martyn

January 30 1859 (Tulira, County Galway) — December 5 1923 (Tulira). Irish playwright and founder of the Irish Literary Theatre.

Life and Education

Edward Martyn was the eldest son of the Irish Catholic landowners John and Annie Josephine Martyn. At the age of eight he went to Belvedere College in Dublin, but later on the family moved to London where Martyn went to Beaumont College. Afterwards he studied at Christ Church College in Oxford.

Highly interested in art he came into contact with music, theatre and literature on a journey across Europe. He was a big promoter of Irish or rather Gaelic history, literature, arts and culture and spent a lot of money on diverse programs and organizations supporting national artists.

The Irish Literary Theatre

In 1899 the found together with Augusta Gregory and W.B. Yeats the Irish Literary Theatre in Dublin which he quit only three years later because of irreconcilable differences with his colleagues. This organization intended to bring forward other Irish playwrights, but they also wrote plays for the theatre themselves. Later it became the famous Abbey Theatre which is the Irish National Theatre.

Works (selection)

1890: Morgante the Lesser

1899: The Heather Field

1899: Maeve

1902: The Tale of a Town

1912: Grangcolman

1914: The Dream Physician

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Sources

http://www.bookrags.com/biography/edward-martyn-dlb/

http://www.britannica.com/EBchecked/topic/367141/Edward-Martyn

http://www.enotes.com/twentieth-century-criticism/martyn-edward