OVERVIEW

• Playwright

  Denis Johnston 

• Setting

  The action of the play opens in the garden of 'The Priory', the home of John Philpot Curran, close to Rathfarnham on the night of the 25th August, 1803.

• Notes

  Johnston's play was first entitled 'Shadowdance' and submitted to the Abbey. Yeats sent it back to him with 'The Old Lady Says 'No!'' (referring to Lady Gregory) scrawled on it, so the author re-titled it and sent it to the Gate.

• Synopsis

  Denis Johnston's first play takes place in the mind of an actor who is playing Robert Emmet in a traditional patriotic drama. The actor is knocked unconscious by accident and in his reverie he imagines he is Emmet walking the streets of present-day Dublin, confronting the jarring contrast between the myth of Ireland and modern day reality, the hypocrisy of contemporary politics and the petty materialism of the populace at large. On the way he encounters latter-day rebels, empty-headed youth, the self-satisfied middle classes, and the statue of the parliamentarian Henry Grattan come to life. Yeats's heroine Cathleen ni Houlihan, the symbol of Ireland, is transformed into a foul-mouthed hag of a flower seller. Emmet finds himself fighting the very people he would redeem. The play parodies the sentimental martyrdoms in Irish literature, and brings in the voices of the great Irish writers who have bequeathed so much to the world's knowledge of itself. Despite its satirical tone the play in the end eloquently presents the revolutionary's cry, "I will take this earth in both my hands and batter it into the semblance of my heart's desire."

• Play Type

  Plays General
  

  Number Of Acts

  Full-Length

• Cast Size Male

  10

• Cast Size Female

  10

Original Production

• Date of First Production

  03 July 1929

• Producer

  Produced by Edwards-Mac Liammoir Gate Theatre Productions

• Original Venue

  Abbey Theatre/Amharclann na Mainistreach
  

• Venue Notes

  Performed on the Peacock stage. The Gate was not to move into its own building until early 1930.

Source Of Information

The information for this entry was taken from the original production programme.