Review: “The Playboy of the Western World” by J. M. Synge

Thumbs up for The Playboy of the Western World by J. M. Synge. Play.

Once, many years ago, a bearded gentleman wearing a tweed jacket with patches on the elbows shaghaied me semi-randomly in a bookstore and waxed rhapsodic for far too long about the plays of J. M. Synge, who was apparently God’s gift to man. That was before Google included a spellcheck, so when I dutifully and unsuccessfully searched for the work of “J. M. Singe,” I felt minor relief that I had so easily fulfilled my promise to try to read him without reading him at all. Having now sampled him in truth, I think perhaps he may be God’s gift to Ireland, but not to me, as there were some large chunks of dialect that refused to make sense to me no matter how many times I read them. What I did understand, I enjoyed, but I am not exactly planning to devour the rest of his output.

“JIMMY — [entirely convinced.] It’s a fright, surely. I knew a party was kicked in the head by a red mare, and he went killing horses a great while, till he eat the insides of a clock and died after.”