Christina Reid

Christina Reid (12 March 1942 – 31 May 2015) was an Irish playwright whose early scripts focused on the working class people of Northern Ireland, and the Troubles. Her work has appeared in theatres in Belfast, London and New York.

Life Reid was born in Ardoyne, North Belfast to James and Christina Orchin, the oldest of three children. Despite living in a part of the city that was predominantly Catholic, the family was Protestant and her father was a Grand Master in the Orange Order. She attended Everton Primary School on the Crumlin Road, Belfast, before entering Model School for Girls in North Belfast. She left school in 1957 at age fifteen and spent the following years working at odd jobs.

In 1963 she married a civil engineer Michael Reid and the couple had three daughters: Heidi, Tara and Siubhan. In the late 1970s, Reid returned to school and completed her O- and A-level exams. In 1981, she enrolled in the English degree programme at Queen's University Belfast, but winning an Ulster Television drama award for her sixty-minute one-act play in 1981 and becoming a single parent following her divorce meant she was not able to complete the programme. Reid then became a writer-in-residence at the Young Vic Theater. She was also a scriptwriter for BBC Radio 4's drama series Citizens.

Books Christina Reid, Plays I, Methuen, 1997.