Weel's Conflict And Conflicts In Translations By Brian Friel

At first glance, one would not imagine the Donnelly twins to play an important role in the play Translations by Brian Friel. However, after taking a closer look, it becomes apparent that this work would be much less meaningful if these characters were not presented. Although they never physically appear, their actions spark the conflict between the English and the Irish, as well as causing the main problem in the storyline to emerge.

The first time we hear of the Donnelly twins is when Manus asks Doalty and Bridget whether or not they will be coming to the hedge school for the lesson in the Act One. After Doalty clearly avoids answering the question, Bridget states, “Our Seamus says two of the soldiers’ horses were found last night at the foot of the cliffs at Machaire Buide and...” (page 15) and then she promptly stops as if she has said too much. Right from the beginning, Friel gives us the feeling that the twins are crafty and mysterious. We are able to infer that they pushed the horses of the cliff because of the context of the conversation.

What would cause them to do this? What inspires them to kill these men’s animals? In order to understand this, we must further understand the relationship between the English and the Irish. For 800 years, England occupied Ireland by oppressing their religious beliefs and destroying their culture by means of force. In the play, the soldiers are in Ballybeg to remap all of Ireland and standardize all of the Gaelic names into English. By doing this they effectively handicapped the Irish culture, angering many of them. The Donnelly twins harass the soldiers because they are not happy about them being in Ballybeg.

After the night of the dance, Yolland, an English lieutenant, mysteriously di...

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... The first is Doalty’s prank on the soldiers mapping. Second, the twins push the horses of the cliff. After that, they kill lieutenant Yolland. Finally, the English camp is set on fire, and the Irish plan to rebel. We can assume, because of their previous actions, that the Donnelly twins are responsible for the fire. Much like in real times of tension in a community, things continued to spiral out of control as neither culture gave in to the other.

The Donnelly twins are very important characters in Brian Friel’s Translations. They not only symbolize many kinds of people in Ireland, but they also move the story along and present us with the major conflict that occurs. The Donnelly twins embody all the actions that the Irish made in order to regain their freedom, and show us the major tensions that were occurring in Ireland during the time of this play’s performance.