Five One Act Plays

by Seán O'Casey

Born in 1880 and schooled on the streets of Dublin, Sean O'Casey became in turn newspaper-seller, docker, stonebreaker, railway worker, builder's labourer, dramatist and, ultimately, a giant of modern Irish literature. The dramatic technique he learned by reading Shakespeare came to fruition in his own canon of great plays, first for Dublin's Abbey Theatre and later for the major stages of the world.

The comedy 'The End of the Beginning' and the sketch 'A Pound on Demand' were both published in 1934 as part of the collection of essays, verse and fiction, entitled 'Windfalls'. 'Hall of Healing', 'A Sincerious Farce', 'Bedtime Story' and 'Time to Go', 'A Morality Comedy', were written in 1951. From the author of 'The Plough and the Stars' and 'Juno and the Paycock', these five plays offer the greatness of O'Casey in vivid microcosm.

Genres: Plays

Unknown Binding

First published January 1, 1958

About the author

Sean O'Casey was born in 1880 and lived through a bitterly hard boyhood in a Dublin tenement house. He never went to school but received most of his education in the streets of Dublin, and taught himself to read at the age of fourteen. He was successively a newspaper-seller, docker, stone-breaker, railway-worker and builders' labourer. In 1913 he helped to organise the Irish Citizen Army which fought in the streets of Dublin, and at the same time he was learning his dramatic technique by reading Shakespeare and watching the plays of Dion Boucicault. His early works were performed at the Abbey Theatre, Dublin, and Lady Gregory made him welcome at Coole, but disagreement followed and after visiting America in the late thirties O'Casey settled in Devonshire. He lived there until his death in 1964, though still drawing the themes of many of his plays from the life he knew so well on the banks of the Liffey. Out of the ceaseless dramatic experimenting in his plays O'Casey created a flamboyance and versatility that sustain the impression of bigness of mind that is inseparable from his tragi-comic vision of life.

He was a major Irish dramatist and memoirist. A committed socialist, he was the first Irish playwright of note to write about the Dublin working classes.

Reviews

[وائل المنعم · Rating 2 out of 5]

Just a funny plays, Not an important literary work, It's right place is to presented in a comic tv show.

I can arrange the five plays from the best to the worst as following :

1. Bedtime story
2. The end of the beginning
3. A pound on deamand
4. Time to go
5. Hall of healing

The Irish accent was very annoying in the beginning but you used to it afterwards.

[Ali · Rating 3 out of 5]

یکی از تک پرده ای های این مجموعه با نام "ماجرای نیمه شب" توسط م. امین موید به فارسی ترجمه شده و انتشارات رز در سال 1350 آن را منتشر کرده که در1354 به چاپ دوم رسیده است.

[Hend · Rating 2 out of 5]

A Pound on Demand