Dublin 1

October 5, 2013

Writing from the beige-pink elegance of my room in the Merrion in Dublin 2.  I suppose I’ve been in showier hotels, but this has layers of charm, personnel of flawless courtesy, and the best art collection–all the Irish masters–I’ve seen outside a museum. Several Georgian houses were combined to make it, one of which was the birthplace of the Duke of Wellington. The flights were perfect, the one from Charlotte here so empty I had three seats to myself to sprawl upon. My taxi driver was Turkish, and I told him how must I loved Istanbul. We chatted about the disastrous conditions of both our countries’ governments. The glitch was that I couldn’t get into my room for eight hours, after 11 hours en route. Planes land at 6 AM and last night’s tourists do not need to be out until noon and the maids need to clean: it’s a problem even the best hotels have not solved, except by chance. It did require me to wander about, and wander about I did. Ate much salad. Drank much wine. The wine, I think, got me loosened up and receptive, when I had been inclined to be crabby and a little inward in my first few hours on the Dublin streets. Sat at the outdoor table where I wrote The Beautiful Johanna and began another play. The intermittent rain was just right. The crazy lady babbling across the street was just right.
After a brief, violent nap I went to the Culture Box to see Rough Magic’s version of Sheridan's The Critic. The drawing room part was in the Culture Box and the theater part was in the Ark, around the block, to which we walked through the distractions of the Temple Bar. The conception was daring, the execution superb (if not quite flawless), the overall impression magnificent. It joins the thin ranks of those plays, comedies or tragedies, which made me weep with gratitude before the end. Most wonderful, and yet most wonderful. I have never seen bad, or even mediocre, acting in Dublin. I have seen flawed conceptions, but the conception here was inspired and inspiring.
Loitered in the Temple Bar, then hiked on my sore feet back here, stopping in Foley’s for a nightcap, where I met Grace and Mark. Grace is a cardiac technician, and Mark is about the task of setting up a law practice. We talked about everything, understood one another, and I did not say to them, but should have, that it was the perfect top-off of a perfect evening.