Irish Poetic Drama in St. Louis

Abstract

On April 17, 1904, T. W. H. Rolleston, of Pembroke Road, Dublin, boarded Cunarder Etruria bound for New York. He was shepherding Historic Loan Collection for Irish Industrial Exhibition at that frontier extravaganza, St. World's Fair. Rolleston thus became a central figure in a transatlantic episode that unfolded between May and July 1904 and reached back into pre-history of Abbey Theatre; it was both an outcome and a cause of some interesting tensions in Dublin dramatic circles, and it touched upon issues of Irish national loyalty, Irish stereotypes, and Irish cultural revival in both Ireland and United States. In published memoirs of leaders, associates, and observers of Irish theater movement, record of what Rolleston called the theatre row in St. Louis is incom-