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Ghost Light
A powerful and deeply moving masterpiece about love, partings and reconciliation -- and of the courage involved in living on nobody else's terms. Dublin, 1907. A young actress begins an affair with a damaged older man, the leading playwright at the theatre where she works. Outspoken and flirtatious, Molly Allgood is a Catholic girl from the slums of Dublin, dreaming of stardom in America. Her lover, John Synge, is a troubled genius, whose life is hampered by convention and by the austere and God-fearing mother with whom he lives. Their affair, sternly opposed by friends and family, is quarrelsome, affectionate and tender.
Many years later, Molly, now a poverty-stricken old woman, makes her way through London's bomb-scarred city streets, alone but for a snowdrift of memories. Her once dazzling has faded but her unquenchable passion for life has kept her afloat.
Many years later, Molly, now a poverty-stricken old woman, makes her way through London's bomb-scarred city streets, alone but for a snowdrift of memories. Her once dazzling has faded but her unquenchable passion for life has kept her afloat.
240 pages, Paperback
First published November 10, 2010
108 people are currently reading
1907 people want to read
About the author
Joseph O'Connor
105 books631 followersThere is more than one author with this name
Joseph O’Connor was born in Dublin. He is the author of the novels Cowboys and Indians (short-listed for the Whitbread Prize), Desperadoes , The Salesman , Inishowen , Star of the Sea and Redemption Falls , as well as a number of bestselling works of non-fiction.
He was recently voted ‘Irish Writer of the Decade’ by the readers of Hot Press magazine. He broadcasts a popular weekly radio diary on RTE’s Drivetime With Mary Wilson and writes regularly for The Guardian Review and The Sunday Independent. In 2009 he was the Harman Visiting Professor of Creative Writing at Baruch College, the City University of New York.
Joseph O’Connor was born in Dublin. He is the author of the novels Cowboys and Indians (short-listed for the Whitbread Prize), Desperadoes , The Salesman , Inishowen , Star of the Sea and Redemption Falls , as well as a number of bestselling works of non-fiction.
He was recently voted ‘Irish Writer of the Decade’ by the readers of Hot Press magazine. He broadcasts a popular weekly radio diary on RTE’s Drivetime With Mary Wilson and writes regularly for The Guardian Review and The Sunday Independent. In 2009 he was the Harman Visiting Professor of Creative Writing at Baruch College, the City University of New York.
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Displaying 1 - 30 of 293 reviews
June 4, 2019
A delightful bookclub re-read. I am not a fan of love stories, but Ghost light by Joseph O’ Connor (Author of Star of the Sea)
is wonderfully imagined and a lovely social and political history of Ireland to boot.
Joseph O’ Connor imagines the relationship between actress Molly Allgood (Playboy of the Western World) and playwright John Synge. It was an affair that broken taboos as he was a protestant in his mid thirties and of higher social class and she a catholic, just turned 18 and from a Dublin working class family.
We are introduced to Molly in London in her latter years, where she remember times past, the good old days at the Abbey Theatre with the Genius John Synge and the days when the “ Playboy of the Western World” was scandalizing the land of Saints and Scholars.
I really enjoyed this book, as the authors writing is vivid and lyrical. The characters are memorable and while most of the story is fiction, it does comes across as very believable and entertaining.
This wasn’t an easy read as I found myself sometimes having to re-read paragraphs but this may be more to do with my lack of concentration than the actual writing or story. It’s a character driven novel that has wit and charm to it. There is an authors note which explains what is real and what is fiction. Another book that I enjoy having on my real life bookshelf.
is wonderfully imagined and a lovely social and political history of Ireland to boot.Joseph O’ Connor imagines the relationship between actress Molly Allgood (Playboy of the Western World) and playwright John Synge. It was an affair that broken taboos as he was a protestant in his mid thirties and of higher social class and she a catholic, just turned 18 and from a Dublin working class family.
We are introduced to Molly in London in her latter years, where she remember times past, the good old days at the Abbey Theatre with the Genius John Synge and the days when the “ Playboy of the Western World” was scandalizing the land of Saints and Scholars.
I really enjoyed this book, as the authors writing is vivid and lyrical. The characters are memorable and while most of the story is fiction, it does comes across as very believable and entertaining.
This wasn’t an easy read as I found myself sometimes having to re-read paragraphs but this may be more to do with my lack of concentration than the actual writing or story. It’s a character driven novel that has wit and charm to it. There is an authors note which explains what is real and what is fiction. Another book that I enjoy having on my real life bookshelf.
March 11, 2019
At the end of life what do we single out and hold up as our finest achievement? For Molly Allgood, an Irish actress, it's her relationship with the playwright John Synge. Ghost Light is narrated, often in the second person, by Molly during a single day at the end of her life. Molly is down on her luck and something of an alcoholic. Therefore, not perhaps the most reliable of narrators. Prone to flights of lyrical beautification, Molly, one suspects, has idealised Synge. What we learn about him, between the lines, isn't always likeable. He's reluctant for example to make their relationship public. This isn't one of those explosive soul-searing literary couplings. Molly and Singe's relationship is perhaps, behind all Molly's poetic waxing, a rather lacklustre affair, only made legendary in her mind by his early death. Yet it's this relationship she calls upon as her last will and testament. I have to confess at times I wasn't quite sure I believed this premise. There was a suspicion that this is a female sensibility interpreted (and distorted) through the lens of a male. Molly has been a successful actress yet dwells little on her professional achievements. Nor does she appear to have made any close friends or been bewitched by places she's visited. Obviously the author wanted to write about her brief relationship with Synge but perhaps the form he chose wasn't the best option. I'm pretty sure at the end of my life I won't be editing my life down to one person I briefly loved and devoting all my energy to recreating our story. I often found Molly more compelling as an old woman than a young girl. Joseph O'Connor writes very well - another lyrical Irishman - and though it went a bit flat towards the end there was still lots to admire in this novel.
December 13, 2023
An intriguing, meandering, beautiful novel.
June 17, 2012
Dublin 1907, a young Irish actress embarks on a doomed affair with John Millington Synge, the Irish playwright. In the 1950s an old, impoverished woman makes her way across London, reminscing about her glory days as an acclaimed actress and her relationship with the enigmatic Synge.
This is a demanding read, more like poetry than prose, requiring the reader to slow down and savour every word, even having to reread sections at times. The second person narration also requires some effort on the reader's part but once accustomed to it, you get a real feel for Molly Allgood and the deep passion she felt for Synge. Molly takes centre-stage in this stream of consciousness narrative which flits between the faded grandeur of her life in the 50s and the vitality and exhuberance of her character in 1907, the year in which she meets Synge and becomes the inspiration for Pegeen, the leading female character in The Playboy of the Western World.
Ireland is in a state of chassis (quoting from Juno and the Paycock, Sean O'Casey!)in 1907 as the country moves towards independence and Molly and Synge's relationship seems equally tumultuous coming as they do from opposing religions, social status and age but this is not a historical novel as such but rather a reimagining of a love story. Molly is an extremely engaging character, vivacious in her youth, resourceful and witty in her later years holding her head up high despite her straitened circumstances with the odd nip of gin providing a much needed boost.
There are equal amounts of tragedy and comedy in this character driven tale. Ultimately it is an uplifting tale despite the doom laden nature of the key players' relationship, the difference in class, the social disapproval and ultimately Synge's untimely death from Hodgkin's disease. Molly shines through the gloom and there's a mischievous glint in her eye and a vitality which remains with the reader.
If you appreciate beautifully written prose and the stream of consciousness style you will thoroughly enjoy this delicate love story, prior knowledge of Synge's literary opus is not a prerequisite but I now feel compelled to revisit The Playboy of the Western World, last viewed about 30 years ago for 'O' Level English!
January 29, 2011
Joseph O’Connor has fashioned a marvelous novel, a reimaging of the love affair of John Millington Synge – the famous playwright of Playboy of the Western World and other fine works – and the younger, less well-stationed Molly Allgood, who performed under the name of Maire O’Neill.
“Certain biographers will want to beat me with a turf shovel,” O’Connor states in his aftermath. Indeed, in reading that aftermath, this is not the book for those who are seeking a historically-correct look into these principals. It is definitely fiction.
But what fiction it is! It sings, glows, and at times, reads like sheer poetry. There are hints of James Joyce in the stream-of-consciousness. It all flows from the title Ghost Light, which O’Connor defines later in the book, “An ancient superstition among people of the stage. One lamp must always be left burning when the theatre is dark, so the ghosts can perform their own play.”
And within the confines of this novel, these “ghosts” definitely do. The “play” begins in 1952; Molly, now quite old and penurious, is in London where is to record a radio play for the BBC studios. There, in an alcoholic haze, she muses upon the highlights of her life: as an actress at Abbey Theatre of Dublin, her acquaintance with Yeats, and most of all, her love affair with the much-older John M. Synge.
She remembers that Synge was “a man who could see into things – very ordinary things…His imagination, or soul, or whatever province of his mind was hungry for the sustaining rain of the world, would soak in the storms of his own haunted strangeness, and the berries would bloom, and they were what they were, and if the tendrils were peculiar, and some of them wild, the fruits were so shockingly luscious and potent that the thirsty were willing to savour the bitter for the sake of the concomitant sweet.”
Ah, poetry! By using the documented framework of Synge – his ascension to the top of his craft, his complicated relationship with his widowed mother (who strongly disapproved of his “liaison”), his engagement to Molly, his early death at age 37 – Mr. O’Connor expands his story, weaving fiction in with the fact. His portrayal of Molly – playful, wayward, with a spirited independence – is sublime. And then, Mr. O’Connor goes further, also weaving some highlights of the Abbey Theatre and the cruelty of class-consciousness into his tapestry. A most amazing book – and very recommended by this reader.
“Certain biographers will want to beat me with a turf shovel,” O’Connor states in his aftermath. Indeed, in reading that aftermath, this is not the book for those who are seeking a historically-correct look into these principals. It is definitely fiction.
But what fiction it is! It sings, glows, and at times, reads like sheer poetry. There are hints of James Joyce in the stream-of-consciousness. It all flows from the title Ghost Light, which O’Connor defines later in the book, “An ancient superstition among people of the stage. One lamp must always be left burning when the theatre is dark, so the ghosts can perform their own play.”
And within the confines of this novel, these “ghosts” definitely do. The “play” begins in 1952; Molly, now quite old and penurious, is in London where is to record a radio play for the BBC studios. There, in an alcoholic haze, she muses upon the highlights of her life: as an actress at Abbey Theatre of Dublin, her acquaintance with Yeats, and most of all, her love affair with the much-older John M. Synge.
She remembers that Synge was “a man who could see into things – very ordinary things…His imagination, or soul, or whatever province of his mind was hungry for the sustaining rain of the world, would soak in the storms of his own haunted strangeness, and the berries would bloom, and they were what they were, and if the tendrils were peculiar, and some of them wild, the fruits were so shockingly luscious and potent that the thirsty were willing to savour the bitter for the sake of the concomitant sweet.”
Ah, poetry! By using the documented framework of Synge – his ascension to the top of his craft, his complicated relationship with his widowed mother (who strongly disapproved of his “liaison”), his engagement to Molly, his early death at age 37 – Mr. O’Connor expands his story, weaving fiction in with the fact. His portrayal of Molly – playful, wayward, with a spirited independence – is sublime. And then, Mr. O’Connor goes further, also weaving some highlights of the Abbey Theatre and the cruelty of class-consciousness into his tapestry. A most amazing book – and very recommended by this reader.
January 1, 2011
Brilliant Writing But Difficult Reading
I really enjoyed O'Connor's 'Star of the Sea' and was eager to read 'Ghost Light'. This novel is a fictionalization of the life of Molly Allgood, who was in love with and engaged to John Synge the Irish playwright at the time of his death.
O'Connor introduces us to Molly who is now sixty five years old living in London, the year is 1952. She is alone and lives in a less than desirable part of the city, she drinks gin to ease her mind and sometimes drinks too much. She looks back on her life and the love she had with Synge. She shares those memories with the reader through the foggy haze of cold, hunger and inebriation.
While much of this novel is beautifully written it was also often difficult to follow, time and place turn in within a thought and it's often difficult to know where you are, in the present or the past.
The narration itself was a bit of a puzzle to me, it too shifts, actions are described in the third person as well as the first person. Some observations are given in an almost staccato rhythm, then a moment later the words are beautifully arranged, nearly poetry. John Synge interjects his thoughts and opinions periodically. And while I'm certain that every word of this novel was intentional, my uncertainty is only with regard to how much I enjoyed it.
I loved some of this novel but as a whole it was difficult to follow. I think writers and fans of literature will appreciate this work. Readers who typically enjoy popular fiction may want to try O'Connor's 'Star of the Sea', which is in my opinion much more accessible to the common man.
I really enjoyed O'Connor's 'Star of the Sea' and was eager to read 'Ghost Light'. This novel is a fictionalization of the life of Molly Allgood, who was in love with and engaged to John Synge the Irish playwright at the time of his death.
O'Connor introduces us to Molly who is now sixty five years old living in London, the year is 1952. She is alone and lives in a less than desirable part of the city, she drinks gin to ease her mind and sometimes drinks too much. She looks back on her life and the love she had with Synge. She shares those memories with the reader through the foggy haze of cold, hunger and inebriation.
While much of this novel is beautifully written it was also often difficult to follow, time and place turn in within a thought and it's often difficult to know where you are, in the present or the past.
The narration itself was a bit of a puzzle to me, it too shifts, actions are described in the third person as well as the first person. Some observations are given in an almost staccato rhythm, then a moment later the words are beautifully arranged, nearly poetry. John Synge interjects his thoughts and opinions periodically. And while I'm certain that every word of this novel was intentional, my uncertainty is only with regard to how much I enjoyed it.
I loved some of this novel but as a whole it was difficult to follow. I think writers and fans of literature will appreciate this work. Readers who typically enjoy popular fiction may want to try O'Connor's 'Star of the Sea', which is in my opinion much more accessible to the common man.
March 19, 2012
This is the first book by Joseph O’Connor (yes, he’s the brother of Sinead O’Connor) I’ve read, but I can tell you, it won’t be the last. I loved Ghost Light, and I intend on investigating this wonderful Irish author further. Joseph O’Connor’s writing runs the gamut from non-fiction and journalism to screenplays, stage plays, and novels, of which Ghost Light is his seventh.
Ghost Light revolves around the great Irish playwright (and co-founder, with William Butler Yeats and Lady Gregory, of Dublin’s Abbey Theatre), John Millington Synge, and his fiancée, the Irish Catholic actress, Molly Allgood, an actress who performed under the name of Maire O’Neill. Synge was fourteen years older than Molly, and a Protestant, things that did make a difference. Their engagement, in fact, their entire relationship, was frowned on by just about everyone, including their families and Yeats. Molly’s friends and family believed she was being led astray by the older Synge, while Synge’s friends and family thought his romance with Molly would cause his art to suffer, thus affecting the success of the Abbey Theatre. Synge had graduated from the university, while Molly had trouble with everyday spelling and punctuation. Synge encouraged Molly to read better books, and to study poetry so she could critique his own work. But Molly Allgood was no student.
As a general rule, the pair kept their love more or less a secret, and when Synge, who was suffering from Hodgkin’s disease, went to convalesce in England, he was filled with worry and suspicion, afraid that a younger “man-about-Dublin” would steal Molly away in his absence. And, though Molly did allow other men to admire her from a distance, she increasingly found Synge’s all-too-frequent absences and the fact that he hovered between sickness and health a bit “too much.” She was, after all, in the prime of life and blessed with good looks, energy, and vitality.
After Molly’s triumphant performance in his play, The Playboy of the Western World, Synge was even more in love, and told Molly: “You are my whole world . . . you that is, and the little shiny new moon . . . .”
When Hodgkin’s claimed Synge’s life in 1909, just weeks shy of his thirty-eighth birthday, Molly was forbidden to go to his funeral by his family.
Though both Molly Allgood and John Synge were real persons, and though Molly was, indeed, Synge’s lover, O’Connor makes it clear that Ghost Light is a work of fiction rather than a biography of a love affair. In fact, at times, the book is all fiction save for the fact that Allgood and Synge were real:
The experiences and personalities of the real Molly and Synge differed from those of my characters in uncountable ways, writes O’Connor. Most of the events in this book never happened at all. Certain biographers will want to beat me with a turf-shovel.
I don’t doubt they will, but the fact that O’Connor made a lot of his facts up didn’t, in any way, dim my enjoyment of his book. I think Ghost Light is am amazing book, and I enjoyed every minute I spent reading it.
The novel opens in 1952, in London, where Molly’s living in a rundown lodging house on the Bayswater Road. Once the toast of the Irish theatre, Molly’s now destitute, and her life revolves around tea, tobacco, and cheap gin. There is, however, one bright spot in Molly’s life: She been hired by the BBC to read a part in a radio play, and even though she knows it’ll be some time before she’s paid, she will be paid – eventually – and the part will jog the memories of those who once saw her and loved her on the Irish stage.
Like many of Sebastian Barry’s books, Ghost Light is a “memory piece.” As Molly walks from Bayswater, across town to the recording studios of the BBC, she thinks about a letter she’s received from a California student who wants an interview:
I could offer a small sum as remuneration for your time. Would an amount of, say, $50 be acceptable? Alternatively I should be happy to send you anything you require to that value, since I know certain goods and foodstuffs are still quite scarce in England. There is another financial question I would like to broach, Miss O’Neill, and I hope I shall do so without offense. I understand some years ago you sold to his surviving family all your letters of an intimate nature from Synge. My institution has authorized me to say, should other manuscripts having to do with JMS and his circle remain in your possession (scripts, revisions, juvenilia, notebooks, drafts, fragments, abandoned works, et cetera) we would be honored to acquire them for our archive.
If Molly had anything of value left, given her circumstances, one would think she would have sold it already. And so she has. A second-hand dealer in Russell Square has purchased all of Molly’s possessions deemed to have been valuable – with the exception of one. Molly still has the very first letter Synge ever wrote to her, a letter in which he apologizes for the criticisms he made of her during a rehearsal at the Abbey Theatre:
It was bloody of me and I am sorry, Synge writes. I allowed myself to become upset. You must permit the words to lead you to the heart words come from. You requested of me advice. That is it.
As Molly walks from her dilapidated rooming house to the BBE broadcasting offices, her mind returns to Dublin in 1908 and her memories of Synge. As she travels the London streets, Molly encounters people and places that remind her of her past, and the reader learns how she met Synge and became his lover. We learn that though she loved him dearly, her relationship with Synge brought Molly more heartbreak than happiness, though it did become the one dominant relationship in Molly’s life.
I thought I would heartily dislike O’Connor’s use of the second person to tell his story, but after reading only two or three pages, it came to seem natural to me. Molly is, after all, speaking to herself. And, using the second person allows O’Connor to layer his story for maximum impact on the reader and to develop a number of disparate themes. We learn about fin de siècle Irish theatre, repressive Irish family life, decline and destitution, the fickle nature of celebrity, and more.
This is a rich novel, with well-developed characters that really come to life. I loved Molly. Her inner voice was radiant, even though it was, at times, filled with self-pity and self-hate. And, she was Irish to her core. This is Molly as she looks at a painting in the National Portrait Gallery:
Heavens to Betsy, what an ugly old trout. Face like a bag of rusted spanners. Imagine, someone paid good money for that glower to be painted. More beauty in the door of a jakes, that’s the God's honest truth. My Jesus Almighty, but there’s hope for us all, Molls. ‘The Duchess of Blandford’. Looks like Mussolini in a wig. Il Duce with udders. God help us.
I found I couldn’t forget Molly, and I felt I understood her pain. Rather than be angry with her when she considers selling Synge’s letter for a bottle of liquor, I understood her destitution, I felt her pain and her poverty, and her need for comfort, even if that comfort was only going to last an hour or two. In Joseph O’Connor’s able hands, Molly Allgood’s a character who simply leaps off the page.
This is a story than goes back and forth in time. I liked that, and I think it worked perfectly in this book. I know some readers like their novels very straightforward and very linear, however, but even those who do will probably like Ghost Light. The jumps in time are so well handled and smooth.
There will be readers who will criticize this book as containing “too much truth” to be a novel, and there will be readers who will criticize it for not being straight biography. I can understand that, but “based on a true story” doesn’t really bother me at all, and it does give O’Connor the opportunity to answer some of the burning questions those of us who love Synge’s plays have always wondered about. Did Synge really, truly love Molly? Did they ever consummate their love? Given the age difference and his ill health, how much did Molly love Synge?
Here’s Molly, in a fictional letter written to Synge from an island off the west coast of Ireland, a place where Molly had gone to learn Irish:
And everything about you gives me the courage I never, ever had and without you I’m like a ghost drifting through some old house of a life and there’s nothing about you I don’t love.
That’s so beautiful that true or not true, I wouldn’t have wanted to miss reading it.
Ghost Light, for me, is a wonderful Irish novel, and the fact that it’s about the theatre and those in the theatre, which I love, and that it revolves around Synge, who’s plays I adore, is just an added bonus. The best thing about the book, however, were the authentic Irish voices:
Johnny Synge’s bit of native. The proddy’s little squaw. That Kingstown playboy’s huer. Insults hurled long ago by the wags of witty Dublin, still audible after more than forty years.
I’m going to read O’Connor’s two previous books, Star of the Sea and Redemption Falls, both very wonderfully received, and darker books than Ghost Light. I expect to love them both.
5/5
Recommended: To those who love the theatre and really well written Irish novels, or simply literary novels of any kind. I studied drama and I act in my local community theatre, so I might have loved this book a bit more than some, but still, theatre lover or not, Joseph O’Connor is an author worth investigating and following.
Ghost Light revolves around the great Irish playwright (and co-founder, with William Butler Yeats and Lady Gregory, of Dublin’s Abbey Theatre), John Millington Synge, and his fiancée, the Irish Catholic actress, Molly Allgood, an actress who performed under the name of Maire O’Neill. Synge was fourteen years older than Molly, and a Protestant, things that did make a difference. Their engagement, in fact, their entire relationship, was frowned on by just about everyone, including their families and Yeats. Molly’s friends and family believed she was being led astray by the older Synge, while Synge’s friends and family thought his romance with Molly would cause his art to suffer, thus affecting the success of the Abbey Theatre. Synge had graduated from the university, while Molly had trouble with everyday spelling and punctuation. Synge encouraged Molly to read better books, and to study poetry so she could critique his own work. But Molly Allgood was no student.
As a general rule, the pair kept their love more or less a secret, and when Synge, who was suffering from Hodgkin’s disease, went to convalesce in England, he was filled with worry and suspicion, afraid that a younger “man-about-Dublin” would steal Molly away in his absence. And, though Molly did allow other men to admire her from a distance, she increasingly found Synge’s all-too-frequent absences and the fact that he hovered between sickness and health a bit “too much.” She was, after all, in the prime of life and blessed with good looks, energy, and vitality.
After Molly’s triumphant performance in his play, The Playboy of the Western World, Synge was even more in love, and told Molly: “You are my whole world . . . you that is, and the little shiny new moon . . . .”
When Hodgkin’s claimed Synge’s life in 1909, just weeks shy of his thirty-eighth birthday, Molly was forbidden to go to his funeral by his family.
Though both Molly Allgood and John Synge were real persons, and though Molly was, indeed, Synge’s lover, O’Connor makes it clear that Ghost Light is a work of fiction rather than a biography of a love affair. In fact, at times, the book is all fiction save for the fact that Allgood and Synge were real:
The experiences and personalities of the real Molly and Synge differed from those of my characters in uncountable ways, writes O’Connor. Most of the events in this book never happened at all. Certain biographers will want to beat me with a turf-shovel.
I don’t doubt they will, but the fact that O’Connor made a lot of his facts up didn’t, in any way, dim my enjoyment of his book. I think Ghost Light is am amazing book, and I enjoyed every minute I spent reading it.
The novel opens in 1952, in London, where Molly’s living in a rundown lodging house on the Bayswater Road. Once the toast of the Irish theatre, Molly’s now destitute, and her life revolves around tea, tobacco, and cheap gin. There is, however, one bright spot in Molly’s life: She been hired by the BBC to read a part in a radio play, and even though she knows it’ll be some time before she’s paid, she will be paid – eventually – and the part will jog the memories of those who once saw her and loved her on the Irish stage.
Like many of Sebastian Barry’s books, Ghost Light is a “memory piece.” As Molly walks from Bayswater, across town to the recording studios of the BBC, she thinks about a letter she’s received from a California student who wants an interview:
I could offer a small sum as remuneration for your time. Would an amount of, say, $50 be acceptable? Alternatively I should be happy to send you anything you require to that value, since I know certain goods and foodstuffs are still quite scarce in England. There is another financial question I would like to broach, Miss O’Neill, and I hope I shall do so without offense. I understand some years ago you sold to his surviving family all your letters of an intimate nature from Synge. My institution has authorized me to say, should other manuscripts having to do with JMS and his circle remain in your possession (scripts, revisions, juvenilia, notebooks, drafts, fragments, abandoned works, et cetera) we would be honored to acquire them for our archive.
If Molly had anything of value left, given her circumstances, one would think she would have sold it already. And so she has. A second-hand dealer in Russell Square has purchased all of Molly’s possessions deemed to have been valuable – with the exception of one. Molly still has the very first letter Synge ever wrote to her, a letter in which he apologizes for the criticisms he made of her during a rehearsal at the Abbey Theatre:
It was bloody of me and I am sorry, Synge writes. I allowed myself to become upset. You must permit the words to lead you to the heart words come from. You requested of me advice. That is it.
As Molly walks from her dilapidated rooming house to the BBE broadcasting offices, her mind returns to Dublin in 1908 and her memories of Synge. As she travels the London streets, Molly encounters people and places that remind her of her past, and the reader learns how she met Synge and became his lover. We learn that though she loved him dearly, her relationship with Synge brought Molly more heartbreak than happiness, though it did become the one dominant relationship in Molly’s life.
I thought I would heartily dislike O’Connor’s use of the second person to tell his story, but after reading only two or three pages, it came to seem natural to me. Molly is, after all, speaking to herself. And, using the second person allows O’Connor to layer his story for maximum impact on the reader and to develop a number of disparate themes. We learn about fin de siècle Irish theatre, repressive Irish family life, decline and destitution, the fickle nature of celebrity, and more.
This is a rich novel, with well-developed characters that really come to life. I loved Molly. Her inner voice was radiant, even though it was, at times, filled with self-pity and self-hate. And, she was Irish to her core. This is Molly as she looks at a painting in the National Portrait Gallery:
Heavens to Betsy, what an ugly old trout. Face like a bag of rusted spanners. Imagine, someone paid good money for that glower to be painted. More beauty in the door of a jakes, that’s the God's honest truth. My Jesus Almighty, but there’s hope for us all, Molls. ‘The Duchess of Blandford’. Looks like Mussolini in a wig. Il Duce with udders. God help us.
I found I couldn’t forget Molly, and I felt I understood her pain. Rather than be angry with her when she considers selling Synge’s letter for a bottle of liquor, I understood her destitution, I felt her pain and her poverty, and her need for comfort, even if that comfort was only going to last an hour or two. In Joseph O’Connor’s able hands, Molly Allgood’s a character who simply leaps off the page.
This is a story than goes back and forth in time. I liked that, and I think it worked perfectly in this book. I know some readers like their novels very straightforward and very linear, however, but even those who do will probably like Ghost Light. The jumps in time are so well handled and smooth.
There will be readers who will criticize this book as containing “too much truth” to be a novel, and there will be readers who will criticize it for not being straight biography. I can understand that, but “based on a true story” doesn’t really bother me at all, and it does give O’Connor the opportunity to answer some of the burning questions those of us who love Synge’s plays have always wondered about. Did Synge really, truly love Molly? Did they ever consummate their love? Given the age difference and his ill health, how much did Molly love Synge?
Here’s Molly, in a fictional letter written to Synge from an island off the west coast of Ireland, a place where Molly had gone to learn Irish:
And everything about you gives me the courage I never, ever had and without you I’m like a ghost drifting through some old house of a life and there’s nothing about you I don’t love.
That’s so beautiful that true or not true, I wouldn’t have wanted to miss reading it.
Ghost Light, for me, is a wonderful Irish novel, and the fact that it’s about the theatre and those in the theatre, which I love, and that it revolves around Synge, who’s plays I adore, is just an added bonus. The best thing about the book, however, were the authentic Irish voices:
Johnny Synge’s bit of native. The proddy’s little squaw. That Kingstown playboy’s huer. Insults hurled long ago by the wags of witty Dublin, still audible after more than forty years.
I’m going to read O’Connor’s two previous books, Star of the Sea and Redemption Falls, both very wonderfully received, and darker books than Ghost Light. I expect to love them both.
5/5
Recommended: To those who love the theatre and really well written Irish novels, or simply literary novels of any kind. I studied drama and I act in my local community theatre, so I might have loved this book a bit more than some, but still, theatre lover or not, Joseph O’Connor is an author worth investigating and following.
February 28, 2012
Ghost Light by Joseph O'Connor is a brilliant and complex book. It is one of the best books I have read in the last five years. The language is poetic and hallucinatory and this is a book where one can't skip passages or lines. Every word is necessary and the whole is a gift put together with the greatest care and love.
The novel is about a grand love affair between Molly Allgood, an actress (stage name Maire O'Neill) and the playwright John Synge, most well-known for his play, Playboy of the Western World. The book starts out in 1952 on the streets of post-war London. Molly, 67 years old, is walking the cold blustery city and freezing. She lives in a hovel and drinks too much. She is hungry and cold, going from one sheltered spot to another and hallucinating from the the alcohol, her hunger and her freezing. She is on her way to a BBC radio reading and on her way she remembers, in broken dream sequences, her relationship with John Synge.
Molly and John Synge had an affair and at the time of their affair she was eighteen years old and he was thirty-six. John was very ill, most likely with lymphoma but perhaps tuberculosis or some other lung disease. He had one neck surgery after another. He lived only two years after they met. They came from opposite sides of the tracks. Molly was an actress who was from a mixed marriage - protestant and catholic - and she worked with her mother in a drapery shop. John came from old money and was of protestant background. He had a symbiotic relationship with his mother which made his relationship with Molly doomed from the start as his mother would not permit him to bring Molly home and threatened to cut off his trust fund should he marry her.
The book goes back and forth in time from 1952 London to 1905 Dublin where Molly and John were involved in a theater group. John was the resident playwright for William Yeats and the Grand Dame of the theater was Lady Augusta Gregory. Molly was an actress in the theater troupe. In those days it was very risqué for women to act.
Molly and John had to keep their affair a secret because John was terribly afraid of anyone finding out. He and Molly met on trains and traveled to Wicklow together for a vacation but acted like they did not know one another in Dublin. The affair was tender and poignant. John was very ill and the marriage was doomed from the start, never to be realized. They remained engaged until John's death. John called Molly his Pegeen, his Changeling girl.
We travel with Molly to the United States where she acted after John's death. She recollects the plays she was in and the popularity she had. She ended up marrying a philandering husband and had two children, a son who died during World War II and a daughter from whom she is semi-estranged because she can not get along with her son-in-law.
The novel contains imagined letters and real letters between the two lovers and hallucinatory memories from Molly's desperate mind as she tries to stay alive despite the difficult circumstances she finds herself in. My favorite parts of the novel are when it travels to 1905 and the reader gets to participate in the acting troupe with the great Synge and Yeats.
Parts of this novel are true and other parts are fictional according to Mr. O'Connor. Mr. O'Connor grew up in Dublin near the Synge house and was fascinated by the playwright's life. This novel is the outcome of his fascination. In some ways it reminded me of the poetic beauty of Colum McCann's Let the Great World Spin. Sense of place is very important. This is a novel with grand scope and great beauty, one that will not be forgotten by any lover of literature.
The novel is about a grand love affair between Molly Allgood, an actress (stage name Maire O'Neill) and the playwright John Synge, most well-known for his play, Playboy of the Western World. The book starts out in 1952 on the streets of post-war London. Molly, 67 years old, is walking the cold blustery city and freezing. She lives in a hovel and drinks too much. She is hungry and cold, going from one sheltered spot to another and hallucinating from the the alcohol, her hunger and her freezing. She is on her way to a BBC radio reading and on her way she remembers, in broken dream sequences, her relationship with John Synge.
Molly and John Synge had an affair and at the time of their affair she was eighteen years old and he was thirty-six. John was very ill, most likely with lymphoma but perhaps tuberculosis or some other lung disease. He had one neck surgery after another. He lived only two years after they met. They came from opposite sides of the tracks. Molly was an actress who was from a mixed marriage - protestant and catholic - and she worked with her mother in a drapery shop. John came from old money and was of protestant background. He had a symbiotic relationship with his mother which made his relationship with Molly doomed from the start as his mother would not permit him to bring Molly home and threatened to cut off his trust fund should he marry her.
The book goes back and forth in time from 1952 London to 1905 Dublin where Molly and John were involved in a theater group. John was the resident playwright for William Yeats and the Grand Dame of the theater was Lady Augusta Gregory. Molly was an actress in the theater troupe. In those days it was very risqué for women to act.
Molly and John had to keep their affair a secret because John was terribly afraid of anyone finding out. He and Molly met on trains and traveled to Wicklow together for a vacation but acted like they did not know one another in Dublin. The affair was tender and poignant. John was very ill and the marriage was doomed from the start, never to be realized. They remained engaged until John's death. John called Molly his Pegeen, his Changeling girl.
We travel with Molly to the United States where she acted after John's death. She recollects the plays she was in and the popularity she had. She ended up marrying a philandering husband and had two children, a son who died during World War II and a daughter from whom she is semi-estranged because she can not get along with her son-in-law.
The novel contains imagined letters and real letters between the two lovers and hallucinatory memories from Molly's desperate mind as she tries to stay alive despite the difficult circumstances she finds herself in. My favorite parts of the novel are when it travels to 1905 and the reader gets to participate in the acting troupe with the great Synge and Yeats.
Parts of this novel are true and other parts are fictional according to Mr. O'Connor. Mr. O'Connor grew up in Dublin near the Synge house and was fascinated by the playwright's life. This novel is the outcome of his fascination. In some ways it reminded me of the poetic beauty of Colum McCann's Let the Great World Spin. Sense of place is very important. This is a novel with grand scope and great beauty, one that will not be forgotten by any lover of literature.
September 28, 2010
Is 'hated it' too strong a statement? I made a very important decision half way through - I decided to give up! I weighed up the pros and cons and realised not only is life too short to stuff a mushroom - it's also too short to wade through treacle! It's extremely rare that I give up on a book - the last one being around 2003... but I found this just didn't work for me on any level - yes, it's poetic/lyrical but if I want to read a poem I'll pick up a book of poetry - by the time you've digested the poem the plot has left the room!
March 29, 2011
At first, I was disappointed by the novel but I soon realised I was wrong. It is ostensibly about Molly, Synge's lover but it is also about old age, memory, moments in time, our lives and the living of them. Our awareness of beauty, pain and the natural world. It is about the comforts of being human and the indominatable spirit of people. I loved it.It is so well-written and structured. A delight!
October 1, 2014
Beautiful evocation of Edwardian Dublin and the love affair between playwright J.M. Synge and Abbey Theatre actress Maire O'Neill. The author used complicated tense changes [present for Synge's or Maire's present--1907 until his death for him; the year 1952 for her] and past for each of their pasts. An omnipotent narrator who will be returning from time to time, starts out by addressing Maire as "You" [he/she is talking to her] and we see that in 1952 London, Maire is a has-been actress and alcoholic living in a dilapidated tenement in penury. She obtains a job at BBC for a radio version of an O'Casey play. She trudges there, in the snowy, wintry weather from her home and besides doing errands, spends her day in the National Portrait Gallery, a church, and the cinema. The story moves back and forth from past to present: events in 'real-time' and those in Maire's memory as she makes her journey, recounting those years. Much remembrance is a type of stream of consciousness. After the broadcast, the story becomes poignant and sad.
The story was slow-moving intentionally, so people wanting a lot of 'action' will not find it here; in fact, if you're not in the mood for it, this novel could be a soporific. The language and descriptions were lovely! The author has a gift for putting words together in new ways meaningfully. Much dialogue was couched in Irish slang or in Irish dialect; I was able to figure them out from context and they added to the richness of the Irish flavor. I especially liked the first half of Chapter 5: a hilarious rehearsal at the Abbey Theatre with Synge, Yeats, Lady Gregory, and Maire. I loved the author's quoting the various songs and ballads. The title was fitting: 'Ghost Light' is a theatrical superstition: when the theater is "dark" [no performances] at least one light is always left on for ghosts to perform their plays. The chapter where Synge meets Maire's mother and brother was written in the form of a play. O'Connor's note at the end was revealing.
Now I'm curious: I must read The Playboy of the Western World by Synge. I'd like to know why there was a big uproar when it was first presented.
The story was slow-moving intentionally, so people wanting a lot of 'action' will not find it here; in fact, if you're not in the mood for it, this novel could be a soporific. The language and descriptions were lovely! The author has a gift for putting words together in new ways meaningfully. Much dialogue was couched in Irish slang or in Irish dialect; I was able to figure them out from context and they added to the richness of the Irish flavor. I especially liked the first half of Chapter 5: a hilarious rehearsal at the Abbey Theatre with Synge, Yeats, Lady Gregory, and Maire. I loved the author's quoting the various songs and ballads. The title was fitting: 'Ghost Light' is a theatrical superstition: when the theater is "dark" [no performances] at least one light is always left on for ghosts to perform their plays. The chapter where Synge meets Maire's mother and brother was written in the form of a play. O'Connor's note at the end was revealing.
Now I'm curious: I must read The Playboy of the Western World by Synge. I'd like to know why there was a big uproar when it was first presented.
April 27, 2011
It took me a few attempts to get into it but I blame that on lack of sleep rather than the book itself. The style of writing requires slow reading and a lot of concentration so that you don't miss any of the beautifully written prose. The main character is Molly Allgood, an Irish actress living in London with little money at her disposal. The book reminises about her life and her relationship with Synge. Through the course of the book we realise that Molly is the ever optimist and even though she is now in a difficult financial situation she is still positive about each and every day (even if she does need the odd sip of gin to get her through the day).
July 4, 2010
I really didn't enjoy this book. I felt that the story didn't flow and it didn't help that it was written as if you are talking to the main character and recounting her story back to her. There were a lot of loose ends in that many of the characters were never fleshed out (ie the main characters daughter, son, husband). I found it hard to like any of the characters and only had a bit of empathy towards the end. I found it a very irritating read and struggled to finish it. Very disappointing.
May 13, 2011
I had a really hard time getting through this book. The abstract had me all excited to read the story of John Millington Synge and the woman he was engaged to at the time of his death, but that felt more like the secondary plot of Ghost Light.
The story is told through the eyes of Synge's fiancée, Molly Allgood, a.k.a. Maire O'Neill. We follow her through a drunken day in London, and every so often she breaks through her alcoholic haze and gives us glimpses into her past. We see her as an up-and-coming actress and then as the grande dame of the Abbey Theatre. We see her tempestuous relationship with Synge, from a secretive beginning, to a heady honeymoon period in Wicklow, to a messy break-up after Synge refuses to marry her, to a melancholy end with Synge's death and Molly's deterrioration to drunken penury.
What made Ghost Light a difficult read was that the narrative kept jumping from the second person to the first person, and the parts of the narrative that were told in the second person were particularly jarring. I can see how the confusion might be a useful device in conveying Molly's state of mind, but it ultimately prevented me from getting truly involved in the story. However, much of the book is beautifully written, and Joseph O'Connor has a way with words and in conveying the atmosphere of Dublin and Wicklow (places I've visited and loved). I definitely want to read his other work.
The story is told through the eyes of Synge's fiancée, Molly Allgood, a.k.a. Maire O'Neill. We follow her through a drunken day in London, and every so often she breaks through her alcoholic haze and gives us glimpses into her past. We see her as an up-and-coming actress and then as the grande dame of the Abbey Theatre. We see her tempestuous relationship with Synge, from a secretive beginning, to a heady honeymoon period in Wicklow, to a messy break-up after Synge refuses to marry her, to a melancholy end with Synge's death and Molly's deterrioration to drunken penury.
What made Ghost Light a difficult read was that the narrative kept jumping from the second person to the first person, and the parts of the narrative that were told in the second person were particularly jarring. I can see how the confusion might be a useful device in conveying Molly's state of mind, but it ultimately prevented me from getting truly involved in the story. However, much of the book is beautifully written, and Joseph O'Connor has a way with words and in conveying the atmosphere of Dublin and Wicklow (places I've visited and loved). I definitely want to read his other work.
April 7, 2024
A “love” story about a writer and an actress who have a secret love affair because of their class difference. I didn’t find the love story was particularly romantic and I didn’t love how the story was written in terms of jumping from past to future as it didn’t really flow and was confusing at times. I liked the references to Ireland and the descriptions of the countryside and the city of London really allowed me to imagine the scenes clearly but overall I found it a bit boring and I didn’t really care about the characters.
June 17, 2019
This evocative novel is an imagining of the love affair between John Synge, the Irish playwright, and Molly Allgood, the actress. The relationship is plagued by differences in age and class but there is a meeting of their spirits that lets them persist in spite of the difficulties. The novel is beautifully written and give a wonderful sense of place in postwar London. The shifting time periods and language made it hard for me to truly connect with the characters. There are a few truly touching moments but I never got a real sense of Molly.
November 7, 2020
Inizio divertente con la storia d'amore chiacchierata fra i due protagonisti, quasi dickensiano. Man mano che il flusso di coscienza prende il sopravvento diventa tutto offuscato, fino agli ultimi giorni di vita della protagonista. In chiaro scuro.
March 30, 2015
I stumbled across this book quite by chance. Some librarian had placed it face out on one of the library shelves to attract attention. I checked it out without knowing what it was about. Why? I was fascinated that the blurbs on the back of the book just raved about the beautiful writing - that they read it for the sheer pleasure. That intrigued me. The idea of reading a book where every sentence and every word was carefully crafted sounded lovely.
I was not disappointed.
The book is a fiction story that grows out of the simple tale that John Millington Synge and Molly Allgood (stage name Maire O'Neill), It takes place on one day (plus a few more) in October 1952. Through daydreams (fueled by alcohol and maybe something else) we glance back at the time from 1905 to 1909 from the time they met until Synge died.
The story is told from Maire O'Neill's perspective in a, for me, unusual narrative style. She is telling the story, but she doesn't say "I did this"; she says "you did this". She refers to herself as you almost all the time. As I was trying to explain this, it occurred to me that this could be related to the fact that she preferred to use her stage name, not her given name. Is there a split between the I and the you that is significant? This is not a literature class, and I won't pursue this idea. Just some thoughts that crossed my mind. There is a kind of a split in that things are not all in the open. Her affair is a secret for a long time for propriety's sake (although she chafes a bit against this). Her sister makes the name Allgood famous (Sara Allgood). Perhaps she prefers her stage name so as not to be in the shadow of her sister. There is underlying sadness in this tale, which is really a tale of love that lasts long after the one part dies.
Ghost light refers to the one light superstitious theatre folks leave on at night so that the ghosts of the theatre may perform their plays. Is Maire O'Neill playing out the ghost play of her life for decades after the death of the man she truly loves?
The author explains what is fact and what is fiction (most of the story) in the afterward. At first, I was not impressed by this alcoholic, has-been actress on the down and out muttering about the past. Slowly, through the storytelling, she grew on me. I think this story will last for a while thanks to the creative and very beautiful writing of Joseph O'Connor.
Just a few examples of some of the writing that caught my eye.
"In the distance, breasting the coast, the southbound train from Dublin leaves an after-thought of smoke in its wake." After-thought. Lovely.
(On watching Synge struggle to write a part of his novel.) "She hears him mumbling to his character the way he sometimes speaks to her: nagging, cajoling, begging them to come to him. 'Whore's bastard, come out!' he bawls so hard that the rooks go clattering from the thatch. As though the words are midges around him and his task is to grasp a particular one of them. She pictures him in a swarm of language." I love the image of a swarm of language.
"Your impulse was to hurry away. You felt doors opening inside you, and you didn't want to go through any of them again."
"The lonely island of the wifely years. The scrubbings with the nail brush, the torn hopes darned, the shilling eked from the housekeeping and hidden away, the leavings reheated, the silences over supper, the clock watched late and the joint sliced thin - like being buried alive together in the same coffin of politeness."
"It was only a year after his death; the memory of him was still fierce in you, so that it could be termed not remembrance but communion."
"I am not thinking about the photographs but of the eye that framed them. The photographer is always in the picture."
There were many others, but these are a few that I happened to think of capturing. Otherwise, I was busy reading and savouring the writing.
I was not disappointed.
The book is a fiction story that grows out of the simple tale that John Millington Synge and Molly Allgood (stage name Maire O'Neill), It takes place on one day (plus a few more) in October 1952. Through daydreams (fueled by alcohol and maybe something else) we glance back at the time from 1905 to 1909 from the time they met until Synge died.
The story is told from Maire O'Neill's perspective in a, for me, unusual narrative style. She is telling the story, but she doesn't say "I did this"; she says "you did this". She refers to herself as you almost all the time. As I was trying to explain this, it occurred to me that this could be related to the fact that she preferred to use her stage name, not her given name. Is there a split between the I and the you that is significant? This is not a literature class, and I won't pursue this idea. Just some thoughts that crossed my mind. There is a kind of a split in that things are not all in the open. Her affair is a secret for a long time for propriety's sake (although she chafes a bit against this). Her sister makes the name Allgood famous (Sara Allgood). Perhaps she prefers her stage name so as not to be in the shadow of her sister. There is underlying sadness in this tale, which is really a tale of love that lasts long after the one part dies.
Ghost light refers to the one light superstitious theatre folks leave on at night so that the ghosts of the theatre may perform their plays. Is Maire O'Neill playing out the ghost play of her life for decades after the death of the man she truly loves?
The author explains what is fact and what is fiction (most of the story) in the afterward. At first, I was not impressed by this alcoholic, has-been actress on the down and out muttering about the past. Slowly, through the storytelling, she grew on me. I think this story will last for a while thanks to the creative and very beautiful writing of Joseph O'Connor.
Just a few examples of some of the writing that caught my eye.
"In the distance, breasting the coast, the southbound train from Dublin leaves an after-thought of smoke in its wake." After-thought. Lovely.
(On watching Synge struggle to write a part of his novel.) "She hears him mumbling to his character the way he sometimes speaks to her: nagging, cajoling, begging them to come to him. 'Whore's bastard, come out!' he bawls so hard that the rooks go clattering from the thatch. As though the words are midges around him and his task is to grasp a particular one of them. She pictures him in a swarm of language." I love the image of a swarm of language.
"Your impulse was to hurry away. You felt doors opening inside you, and you didn't want to go through any of them again."
"The lonely island of the wifely years. The scrubbings with the nail brush, the torn hopes darned, the shilling eked from the housekeeping and hidden away, the leavings reheated, the silences over supper, the clock watched late and the joint sliced thin - like being buried alive together in the same coffin of politeness."
"It was only a year after his death; the memory of him was still fierce in you, so that it could be termed not remembrance but communion."
"I am not thinking about the photographs but of the eye that framed them. The photographer is always in the picture."
There were many others, but these are a few that I happened to think of capturing. Otherwise, I was busy reading and savouring the writing.
November 14, 2017
“In the top floor room of the dilapidated townhouse across the Terrace, a light has been on all night.” – this is how Joseph O’Connor opens his novel Ghost Light.
Ghost Light was a book that squeezed me by the heart several times. I was left restless and facing emotions I did not want to face while reading it, because of the richness of its style, the masterful narration, and the vivid characters. The scenes describing Marie O’Neill as a poor alcoholic who is left to the elements, so to speak, were devastating. It almost reduced me to tears and extreme empathy, without being unnecessarily cheesy or melodramatic.
What I thought about while I was reading this book was "dignity goes last". Or the shreds of it, left after a full and ambitious life has been reduced to cold, hunger, and drinking. A celebrated actress in her time, Maire O’Neill roams the streets of London hungry, unrecognized, and plagued by memories. A bottle in her hand, intoxicated and hungry, she is dependent on the help of others to survive – the warmth of a movie theatre, the free treat of a local barkeeper, or the occasional book or letter from her past bought by a lovable bookseller. But still, even in such conditions, Maire O’Neill moves and lives with the dignity she had had while at her prime. Dignity she would not simply let go of. And even though her character has become unreliable at the time of the story, you can still trust her memories as they unwind during the narration and build a landscape of her past while she slowly fades.
When a theatre is empty and unoccupied, one lone lamp or other light is always left to glow. This is called a “ghost light”. It is left on so that ghosts can perform their plays while no one else is there. Just as the light from the opening sentence of Ghost Light – shining for Maire O’Neill performing the role of her life while everyone else has left the stage of her life and is long gone.
Ghost Light was a book that squeezed me by the heart several times. I was left restless and facing emotions I did not want to face while reading it, because of the richness of its style, the masterful narration, and the vivid characters. The scenes describing Marie O’Neill as a poor alcoholic who is left to the elements, so to speak, were devastating. It almost reduced me to tears and extreme empathy, without being unnecessarily cheesy or melodramatic.
What I thought about while I was reading this book was "dignity goes last". Or the shreds of it, left after a full and ambitious life has been reduced to cold, hunger, and drinking. A celebrated actress in her time, Maire O’Neill roams the streets of London hungry, unrecognized, and plagued by memories. A bottle in her hand, intoxicated and hungry, she is dependent on the help of others to survive – the warmth of a movie theatre, the free treat of a local barkeeper, or the occasional book or letter from her past bought by a lovable bookseller. But still, even in such conditions, Maire O’Neill moves and lives with the dignity she had had while at her prime. Dignity she would not simply let go of. And even though her character has become unreliable at the time of the story, you can still trust her memories as they unwind during the narration and build a landscape of her past while she slowly fades.
When a theatre is empty and unoccupied, one lone lamp or other light is always left to glow. This is called a “ghost light”. It is left on so that ghosts can perform their plays while no one else is there. Just as the light from the opening sentence of Ghost Light – shining for Maire O’Neill performing the role of her life while everyone else has left the stage of her life and is long gone.
June 4, 2014
I learned of O'Connor in my search to read more about Ireland. One review I read mentions it being the kind of book where you find yourself reading passages aloud to someone; reading and rereading sentences. It happened to me. Fiction but based on the noted Irish playwright and novelist J. M. Synge and his young lover, Molly, I now also have an interest in learning more about Synge who died at age 37. and I will read more by O'Connor.
I gave up recording quotes I liked..there were too many - some long passages and some just a few words but I can't resist sharing a few... like this example as Molly tries to describe her lover:...
"The sort of man who makes you think the movement of foliage might be causing the breeze."
I mean...you have to re-read that!
And Molly,frustrated about their daily writing to each other when they are apart: "If only they could spend time actually having their feelings rather than thinking up new ways of putting them into words."
I gave up recording quotes I liked..there were too many - some long passages and some just a few words but I can't resist sharing a few... like this example as Molly tries to describe her lover:...
"The sort of man who makes you think the movement of foliage might be causing the breeze."
I mean...you have to re-read that!
And Molly,frustrated about their daily writing to each other when they are apart: "If only they could spend time actually having their feelings rather than thinking up new ways of putting them into words."
September 2, 2016
Joseph O'Connor continues to be one of my favorite authors. His prose is beautiful, it sparkles with originality. Ghost light features Molly Allgood, an actress engaged to Irish playwright John Synge and the inspiration for his character 'Pegeen' in The Playboy of the Western World.
Not meant to be taken as fact, O'Connor imagines their affair and takes it from their first meeting to Allgood's final day. Irreverent and competitive with her older sister, also an actress, we follow Molly through her career on stage in Dublin and ending on the streets of London as a doddering old woman, destitute, but getting by with a nip of gin. She has a letter she knows could be worth some money, it could help her survive for a bit longer.
Read this if you love language.
Not meant to be taken as fact, O'Connor imagines their affair and takes it from their first meeting to Allgood's final day. Irreverent and competitive with her older sister, also an actress, we follow Molly through her career on stage in Dublin and ending on the streets of London as a doddering old woman, destitute, but getting by with a nip of gin. She has a letter she knows could be worth some money, it could help her survive for a bit longer.
Read this if you love language.
February 12, 2011
I chose this book based on a rave blurb by Danny Boyle, but wish I'd read further about the theme. This is a genre that I hardly ever read, and very seldom enjoy: fictionalized biographies where the author admittedly takes liberties with fact. Even one as well written as Ghost Light contains certain limitations that are hard to overlook. The potential is here for a ripping good story since the theater is a notorious hotbed of passions and intrigue, with interesting personalities to flesh it out. But I had a hard time trying to escape the inaccuracies, and the structure, while interesting, did provide a bit of disorganized confusion.
October 9, 2014
An intense, slow read, written in the second person with the odd editorial-fail lapse into third. Beautiful phrasing and language.
Molly Allgood (Maire O'Neill - stage name) is brought to life more than her lover, John Millington Synge as the story revolves around her passion for him. The story goes back and forth between her present day (1952)alcoholism and her reflections on her past with him at the beginning of the century before he died of Hodgkins in 1907
Molly was the inspiration for Pegeen in the Playboy of the Western World and her brief shining days in the sun are beautifully captured.
Molly Allgood (Maire O'Neill - stage name) is brought to life more than her lover, John Millington Synge as the story revolves around her passion for him. The story goes back and forth between her present day (1952)alcoholism and her reflections on her past with him at the beginning of the century before he died of Hodgkins in 1907
Molly was the inspiration for Pegeen in the Playboy of the Western World and her brief shining days in the sun are beautifully captured.
December 14, 2014
I admit, I probably didn't give it a chance. As soon as I noticed the gimmicky way of writing I skim read the book. I just can't help it, I can imagine the author of the book going "Ooh, this will win lot of awards, I put together some quirky stuff with no commas in random order. Yeah, that'll do it."
October 28, 2010
This was one of the rare times I gave up on a book before the halfway point. Between the main character's mind drifting in and out of the present, and the fractured narrative, I just couldn't do it.
March 3, 2011
Very disappointing - apparently you "get" this book only if you know Irish playwright John Synge...which I don't
February 2, 2012
I couldn't even finish the book it was that bad. That's a first for me.
March 28, 2020
Beautiful, lyrical and an absolute delight. No words of mine can do it justice. I adore how O’Connor writes.
February 16, 2020
Au début, on s'entendait bien, toi et moi, je t'écoutais parler durant des heures de cet amour caché, tristement avorté, plombé par les promesses non tenues, les espoirs déçus, les occasions ratées. J'aimais ta nostalgie, ce ton amer et espiègle, qui combattait le malheur par le rire. Après j'ai eu plus de mal à te suivre dans le labyrinthe de tes souvenirs désordonnés. C'est devenu confus, et je me suis demandé finalement si cette histoire d'amour était à la hauteur de la tristesse qu'elle provoquait en toi.
August 5, 2024
Hm
I'm not sure quite what to make of this book. I have read his other books and enjoyed them more; a lot more than this. There's a bit of humour involved which helps enjoy it more but it's more about understanding the actual story.
I'm not sure quite what to make of this book. I have read his other books and enjoyed them more; a lot more than this. There's a bit of humour involved which helps enjoy it more but it's more about understanding the actual story.
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