Spectrality and Hospitality in Brian Friel’s Translations

Drawing upon Richard Kearney’s readings of the theories of Paul Ricoeur and Jacques Derrida (although not entirely indebted to his interpretation of either thinker), this article proposes an examination of Brian Friel’s Translations that will elucidate how this seminal Irish play stages moments of ethicality via linguistic, carnal, and, ultimately, what I term ‘spectral hospitality’ that allows for non-violent encounters between supposedly closed off conceptions of selves and others. Derrida’s Specters of Marx is the primary Derridean text utilised for the hauntological analysis that shapes this article. Spectral hospitality is considered as encompassing carnal and linguistic ethicality without ever being just one or the other. Translations is interpreted as envisaging in microcosm how an ethical, open, messianic Ireland ‘to come’ might be forged. I argue that this reading of Translations can also be used to elucidate points of connection and of departure between the work and thought of Ricoeur and Derrida.