The Complete Works Of John Millington Synge

About the Book

Edited and with an Introduction by Aidan Arrowsmith, Manchester Metropolitan University The literary and dramatic work of J.M. Synge is most famous for the riots provoked by his 1907 play The Playboy of the Western World and, indeed, this was neither the first nor the last time that Synge's dramas incited passionate disagreements. But, one hundred years on, it's clear that his writings are amongst Ireland's most brilliant and significant, as well as controversial. Here, for the first time, a single volume collects all of Synge's published plays, including Playboy, along with his Poetry and Translations, and the prose works that detail his travels in The Aran Islands, In Wicklow, In Kerry and In Connemara. These are works of lasting and universal value, bringing together the sensibilities of Romanticism and Modernism, and arguing passionately for the freedom of the imagination. At the outset of the twentieth century, they not only gripped audiences with their drama, poetry and humour, they also shaped discussions about the formation of the Irish nation. Now, reading these works together in one volume reveals Synge's value system and shines a penetrating light on a key period in Irish history. A new Introduction by Aidan Arrowsmith, of Manchester Metropolitan University, explains Synge s relationship to the intense political turmoil out of which his writing emerged

About the Author

John Millington Synge

John Millington Synge was born on April 16th, 1871, in Rathfarnham, Ireland.

Synge was a key figure in the Irish Literary Revival, contributing prose, poetry, and drama to the literary community. He was a founding member of the Abbey Theatre along with Lady Gregory and W.B. Yeats. Synge is best known for his play, The Playboy of the Western World, which caused riots in the streets of Dublin after its opening performance at the Theatre. Considered one of the foremost English-language dramatists, Synge was the most highly esteemed playwright at the turn of the twentieth century (Poetry Foundation). He developed Hodgkin’s lymphoma during the end of his life and died shortly before his 38th birthday.

Born the last of five children, Synge and his siblings were raised by their deeply Protestant mother after their father died in 1872 (Poetry Foundation). He was a part of a well-off, upper class family and his mother was able to afford to send all five children to private school. Synge attended school beginning at age ten for four years, but he soon developed health problems that prevented regular attendance. He spent most of his childhood outside, observing nature and watching birds, while his mother hired a tutor to teach him from home (Stair Na Heireann). In 1892, Synge earned his degree from Trinity College in Dublin in music. At this time in his life, J.M. Synge was an ambitious musician with a focus in violin, theory, and composition. It was also around this time that Synge began writing poetry. In 1893, Synge moved out of his mothers home and traveled to Germany to study music. He soon found he was too nervous to perform, and moved to Paris in 1894 to study language and literature instead. It was here that Synge met his good friend and mentor, W.B. Yeats, in 1896. Upon reading Synge’s poetry, Yeats urged his friend to leave Paris in order to further develop his writing. The advice of his friend led Synge to travel back and forth to the Aran Islands for a number of years.

During these travels, Synge was already living with the early effects of the lymphoma that ended his life (Britannica). His observations and impressions of life on the Aran Islands were recorded and later inspired one of Synge’s most famous plays, The Playboy of the Western World.The play, with its unsentimental treatment of Irishmen’s love for boasting and their tendency to promote ruffians and outcasts, caused riots in the streets of Dublin during it’s first run at the Abbey Theatre (Britannica).

Notably, one of Synge’s best works came as Riders to the Sea, a short, one act play written in 1904. Despite its length, Riders to the Sea was hailed as “almost perfect” by critics. Synge had captured the true plight of the rural Irish (Poetry Foundation). As the lymphoma grew, Synge continued to write. He was able to draft, but not complete, his final play Deirdre of Sorrows before the cancer took his life on March 24, 1909. The draft was given to Synge’s good friends, W.B. Yeats and Lady Gregory, who performed the play as-is in Synge’s memory (Poetry Foundation).

In the years to follow the success of the play, many critics came to reason if the Deirdre of Sorrows had been finished by Synge, it would have been his masterpiece (Poetry Foundation). John Millington Synge had grown as an artist throughout his lifetime – changing and shaping his writing abilities through hard-pressed observations. This lifetime of realistic, powerful writing is why J.M. Synge is considered one of the foremost English language dramatists in the twentieth century.