George Ryga is a Canadian playwright, best known for his play The Ecstasy of Rita Joe. Born in Deep Creek, Alberta, Canada on July 27, 1932 to poor Ukrainian immigrant parents, Ryga was forced to stop his schooling at grade 6 and worked a variety of jobs to support himself and his family. Although he was not formally educated, he continued to study and took correspondence courses. and won a scholarship to the Banff Centre for the Arts. In 1955, Ryga traveled to Europe to study the poetry of Robert Burns and participate in the World Assembly for Peace in Helsinki.
Ryga returned to Canada in 1956 and began living in Edmonton, Alberta. He published his first book, a collection of poems entitled Song of My Hands, in 1956. In 1961, Ryga’s first play, Indian, was performed on television. Ryga drew on his experiences working alongside members of the Cree nation on farms in Deep Creek. He rose to fame for his play The Ecstasy of Rita Joe in 1967. In addition to his plays, Ryga also wrote lyrics for a series of songs for the Canadian band, Chilliwack. Many of Ryga’s works were considered to be controversial and polarizing. His play, Captives of a Faceless Drummer (1971), about the October Crisis of 1970, was commissioned by the Vancouver Playhouse. Ultimately, the board of directors refused to produce the play, leading to Ryga’s reputation as a radical playwright.
Some of Ryga’s other notable works include Grass and WIld Strawberries (1969), Sunrise for Sarah (1973), and Ploughman of the Glacier (1977). His final work, In the Shadow of the Vulture (1985), was also published in the USSR and the Ukraine. George Ryga died in Summerland, British Columbia from stomach cancer on November 18, 1987. He had been nominated for an Honorary Doctorate at the University of Athabasca, and to honor his memory, Professor David Gregory published The Athabasca Ryga (1990), a collection of unpublished essays, stories, and scripts. His home was turned into an arts and culture center and some of his works were published posthumously. Since 2004, the George Ryga Award for Social Awareness in Literature has been presented to a writer from British Columbia annually and in 2016 the Ryga Arts Festival was established.
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