A very great talent that was well used

THE writer Brian Friel, who died aged 86 yesterday, did as much as anyone, and far, far more than most, to try to help us untangle our ideas of ourselves and how we are inescapably the children of our past.

One of his most memorable works, Translations, which came in an incredible wave of creativity stretching across just 18 months in 1979 and 1980 when it, Aristocrats and Faith Healer were given their first performances, made a lasting impression on many who saw it at that time.

The play came to prominence at a time when the North’s troubles were at such a terrible pitch that any rational discussion about how peace might be achieved seemed all but impossible. Translations deals with the translation of Irish place names into English and framed the legacy of Anglo-Irish interactions in a way that made a significant contribution to the passionate debates about cultural identity and revisionism that animated public debate in such a forceful way in the 1970s and 1980s. It is not over-stating the case to argue that the challenging work of people like Friel — and Heaney — helped force the hand, even if at one step’s remove, of those who imagined that there might be a resolution of the Troubles that did not involve tolerance, discussion and compromise. Friel had a great talent and a great sense of humour. He used those gifts in a way resonates far beyond the stage and for that we are in his debt