John Arden
1930 - 2012
John Arden was born in Barnsley, Yorkshire in 1930. Plays produced at the Royal Court Theatre, London include 'The Waters of Babylon' (1957), 'Live Like Pigs' (1958) and 'Sergeant Musgrave's Dance' (1959). His play, 'Armstrong's Last Goodnight' (1964), was first produced at the Glasgow Citizen's Theatre and then at the Royal National Theatre, London. He has also collaborated on many plays with his wife, Margaretta D'Arcy. Arden's novels include 'Silence Among the Weapons' (1982), 'Books of the Bale' (1988) and 'Cogs Tyrannic' (1991). His numerous awards include the Evening Standard Award (1960), the Giles Cooper Award, (1982) and a 1982 Booker nomination. Arden and D'Arcy moved to County Galway in the early 1970s. Their 26-hour 'Non-Stop Connolly Show' was staged in Liberty Hall in Dublin over the Easter Weekend of 1975. An Irish-language production of 'Sergeant Mulgrave's Dance' was performed in the Taibhdhearc in 1974, directed by Eamonn Draper and starring Mick Lally.