Edward Martyn in the context of Celtic Twilight

The Celtic Revival (also referred to as the Celtic Twilight) is a variety of movements and trends in the 19th, 20th and 21st centuries that see a renewed interest in aspects of Celtic culture. Artists and writers drew on the traditions of Gaelic literature, Welsh-language literature, and Celtic art—what historians call insular art (the Early Medieval style of Ireland and Britain). Although the revival was complex and multifaceted, occurring across many fields and in various countries in Northwest Europe, its best known incarnation is probably the Irish Literary Revival. Irish writers including William Butler Yeats, John Millington Synge, Lady Gregory, "Æ" Russell, Edward Martyn, Alice Milligan and Edward Plunkett (Lord Dunsany) stimulated a new appreciation of traditional Irish literature and Irish poetry in the late 19th and early 20th century.

In aspects the revival came to represent a reaction to modernisation. This is particularly true in Ireland, where the relationship between the archaic and the modern was antagonistic, where history was fractured, and where, according to Terry Eagleton, "as a whole [the nation] had not leapt at a bound from tradition to modernity". At times this romantic view of the past resulted in historically inaccurate portrayals, such as the promotion of noble savage stereotypes of the Irish people and Scottish Highlanders, as well as a racialized view that referred to the Irish, whether positively or negatively, as a separate race.

A drawing room play is a type of play, developed during the Victorian period in the United Kingdom of Great Britain and Ireland. They set upper and middle-class characters confronting a social problem of the time with a comedic twist. The play is formed from a blend of three parts: part well-made play, part society drama, part comedy of manners. Exponents of this style include Henrik Ibsen, Arthur Wing Pinero, George Bernard Shaw, Oscar Wilde, Edward Martyn and George Moore.

The name drawing room play has its origins in the upper and middle classes of Victorian society, who with time on their hands, enacted amateur plays for the pleasure of their families in the drawing room.

Isabella Augusta, Lady Gregory (née Persse; 15 March 1852 – 22 May 1932) was an Anglo-Irish dramatist, folklorist and theatre manager. With William Butler Yeats and Edward Martyn, she co-founded the Irish Literary Theatre and the Abbey Theatre, and wrote numerous short works for both companies. Lady Gregory produced a number of books of retellings of stories taken from Irish mythology. Born into a class that identified closely with British rule, she turned against it. Her conversion to cultural nationalism, as evidenced by her writings, was emblematic of many of the political struggles that occurred in Ireland during her lifetime.

Lady Gregory is mainly remembered for her work behind the Irish Literary Revival. Her home at Coole Park in County Galway served as an important meeting place for leading Revival figures, and her early work as a member of the board of the Abbey was at least as important as her creative writings for that theatre's development. Lady Gregory's motto was taken from Aristotle: "To think like a wise man, but to express oneself like the common people."