The Brian Friel Centre
On its way
The Brian Friel Centre will be a dynamic cultural hub celebrating the life, work, and cultural legacy of this internationally acclaimed playwright and short story writer. At the heart of the local community, it will be a vibrant venue for the arts, a resource for students of theatre and a tourist attraction reaching far beyond this north-west corner of Ireland.
“When I was a boy, we always spent a portion of our summer holidays in my mother’s old home near the village of Glenties in County Donegal. I have memories of those holidays that are as pellucid, as intense, as if they happened last week”
— Brian Friel
The Brian Friel Centre is a labour of love in three parts.
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Exhibition and Performances
The Courthouse in Glenties will be the centrepiece, an innovatively designed venue where the imagination can take flight in a hugely versatile exhibition, event, and performance space, a genuine cultural and community hub.
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Guided Tours and Garden
The fully restored Laurels Cottage, home to his mother’s people and setting for Dancing at Lughnasa, will recreate for visitors a snapshot of rural Ireland of the 1930s, with a beautifully landscaped garden and performance area.
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Self-Guided Walks
Complementing the Courthouse and the Laurels will be The Frielscape Heritage Trail where visitors can experience the places, sights and sounds that shaped the young imagination and helped form the writer he was to become.