“Honouring Their Waking Lives”: Love and Memory After Atrocity

The following conversation between Kieran Griffiths (director of The White Handkerchief), Chloe Harkin (stage manager of The White Handkerchief), and Méadhbh McIvor (special projects editor, Political Theology) took place at the Derry Playhouse on 8th July 2022. It has been lightly edited for length and clarity. The White Handkerchief tells the story of Bloody Sunday, the 1972 massacre in which British soldiers shot at unarmed civilians during a civil rights march in the Bogside, a predominately Catholic area of Derry, Northern Ireland. Thirteen people died on Bloody Sunday itself, while others sustained life-altering injuries. The play’s title references the most famous photograph of the massacre, in which Catholic priest Fr Edward Daly waves a bloodied handkerchief before him as a group of men carry the fatally wounded body of a 17-year-old boy in search of medical treatment. The White Handkerchief premiered at the Derry Playhouse on 30th January 2022, the 50th anniversary of Bloody Sunday. It is the first in a trilogy directed by Kieran Griffiths that focuses on the Troubles and the subsequent peace process.