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1916
I have been asked to say something about the intentions and ideasthat underlie the three short plays in this volume.
These plays were conceived in the early days of the Irish NationalTheatre. I had been one of the group that formed the NationalTheatre Society and I wrote plays for players who were my colleaguesand my instructors; I wrote them for a small, barely-furnished stagein a small theatre; I wrote them, too, for an audience that wastremendously interested in every expression of national character."The Land" was written to celebrate the redemption of the soil ofIreland—an event made possible by the Land Act of 1903. This event,as it represented the passing of Irish acres from an alienlandlordism, was considered to be of national importance. "The Land"also dealt with a movement that ran counter to the rooting of theCeltic people in the soil—emigration—the emigration to America ofthe young and the fit. In "The Land" I tried to show that it was notaltogether an economic necessity that was driving young men andwomen out of the Irish rural districts; the lack of life and thelack of freedom there had much to do with emigration.
"The Land" touched upon a typical conflict, the conflict between theindividual and that which, in Ireland, has much authority, thefamily group. This particular conflict was shown again in "TheFiddler's House." where the life, not of the actual peasants, but ofrural people with artistic and aristocratic traditions, was shown.
I tried to show the same conflict working out more tragically in theplay of middle-class life, "Thomas Muskerry." Here I went above thepeasant and the wandering artist and came to the official. I hadintended to make plays about the merchant, the landowner, thepolitical and the intellectual leader and so write a chapter in anIrish Human Comedy. But while I was thinking of the play that isthird in this volume my connection with the National Theatre Societywas broken off. "Thomas Muskerry" was produced in the Abbey Theatreafter I had ceased to be a member of the group that had founded it.
PADRAIC COLUM NEW YORK August, 1916
CONN HOURICAN, a Fiddler.
MAIRE (Mary) [1] HOURICAN, his daughter.
ANNE HOURICAN, a younger daughter.
BRIAN MACCONNELL, a younger farmer.
JAMES MOYNIHAN, a farmer's son.
The action passes in the Houricans' house in the Irish Midlands.
[Footnote 1: The name is pronounced as if written "Maurya."]