Gerald Macnamara, the pseudonym of Harry C. Morrow Biography

Northern Irish playwright and actor, born in Belfast, where he ran a decorating business in addition to his theatrical activities, which remained on an amateur basis throughout his career. MacNamara was a leading writer and actor with the Ulster Literary Theatre, which produced twelve of his plays, chiefly comedies making incisive commentaries on the Northern Irish situation. Among the more notable are Suzanne and the Sovereigns (performed 1907), a satire on sectarian rivalries; The Mist that Does Be On the Bog (performed 1909), a parody of the Abbey Theatre's ‘peasant play’ genre; and No Surrender (performed 1924), which satirizes aspects of Ulster society. Thompson in Tir-na-nOg (1918), his only published work, presents the transportation of a dullwitted Ulsterman to the Gaelic Land of Youth.