Brian Friel, who was born and raised in Northern Ireland, is called the bestliving Irish dramatist dealing with subjects focused on Ireland and its people in hisplays.
In Faith Healer(1979), one of his best plays, Friel dramatizes a faith healer'sexperiences. The three characters, Frank(faith healer), Grace(Frank's wife),Teddy(Frank's manager) recollect the experiences they shared while travelling to curethe sick in Scotland and Wales. Their monologues detail the same experiences butare very different, according to Friel, because each recalls their memories accordingto their own desires and needs. Memory is not always accurate and can be afiction.
Frank has the compulsion to transform all things around him into fiction. Thisability is analogous to a writer's creative writing ability. Therefore, Frank is, in asense, an artist.
Frank performs his faith healing shows in front of the sick with anxiety as heis not sure whether a miracle will occur or not. Like a faith healer, a dramatist asan artist writes dramas with anxiety because he is not sure that he will be able tomove his audience with a successful performance. Frank is not sure that he will beable to move his audience. Frank is not sure if he has an ability to cure withmiracles or if he is a con man. Like a faith healer, an artist has the sense ofbeing a con man because he is indebted from his predecessors' works. Onlythrough his death can Frank stop the maddening questions such as "Am I a conman? or am I endowed with a unique gift?" Frank is like a metaphor for an artist.
Friel, a dramatist, also has suffered from the agony of an artist and has beentroubled by the scarcity of his creative works. Therefore Frank is a foil to Friel'sautobiographical image.