A chara, - There are two purposes of a national theatre. One is to use art to challenge the "nation", i.e. to hold up a mirror to the national psyche and say "this is you", and the second is to use art to open a window on the world so that the people of the nation may see themselves more clearly in an international context.
Clearly the Abbey has been doing both these things. That it has not had a greater impact is due to the fact that bourgeois Dublin is simply not interested. Whether it is not interested in theatre or not interested in the Northside, doesn't really matter.
For the Abbey to have to move to Dublin 4 in order to have an "impact" would represent a defeat for the theatre. It would represent a capitulation to the bourgoisie, and an abandonment of the core values outlined above. It would be a recognition that the cosy middle and upper classes are the only people who really matter to the board of the Abbey. For who else but the comfortable bourgoisie would make preposterous claims like "there is nothing to do" adjacent to the Abbey, and that it is a "no-go area" after dark.
Last summer I saw Medea at the Abbey. We started our evening with a stroll down North Great George's Street and O'Connell Street and then stopped into the bustling Talbot 101 restaurant for a great early bird meal (at about £10 a head). At 7.40 we walked around the corner to the Abbey for the show (which was mesmerising). Later we had a drink in the theatre bar and then moved on to Mohan's bar in Phibsboro for a nightcap. We did all of this on foot, and, as has been the case for the last five years of living in the north inner city, met no trouble or hassle from anyone.
I am certain this is just the kind of enjoyable evening the board of the Abbey would like for all its patrons. However, it would appear from their latest proposals that they believe my evening could have been so much more enjoyable had I spent it wandering amongst the (yet to be built) offices and apartment blocks of Grand Canal Docks. I think not.
Certainly redevelop the theatre, but do it on the present historic site or at a push, move the complex to O'Connell Street. But please, not Dublin 4, not the bosom of middle-Ireland. Even the Abbey couldn't survive the Dort-class love-in that would ensue. - Is mise,
Conor Meade, Clontarf, Dublin 3.