John Millington Synge

J. M. Synge was born in Rathfarnham, Co. Dublin, and grew up in Dublin. After earning a degree in Irish and Hebrew at Trinity College, Dublin, Synge, a talented musician, went to Germany in order to study music. He soon abandoned this career in favour of pursuing his literary interests. Following the advice of his mentor and friend W. B. Yeats, Synge went to the Aran Islands in 1898 to immerse himself in the language, history and local folklore. He was to return to the islands for the next five summers and a book-length journal of his time there, The Aran Islands, was published in 1907. The experience of living among the island community inspired many of Synge's plays and helped his breakthrough as a writer with an eye for the harsh realities of peasant life and an ear for the humour and characteristic nuances of Hiberno-English. Synge's plays The Shadow of the Glen and Riders to the Sea were accepted by the Irish National Theatre and staged in 1903 and 1904 respectively. The former was again staged following the opening of the Abbey Theatre in 1904, of which Synge became a director along with Yeats and Lady Gregory. Although Synge's plays were often criticized by Irish nationalists - his most famous play, The Playboy of the Western World, even sparked a riot among the audience on its opening night on 26 January 1907 - the stylised realism of his writing continued to influence the Abbey Theatre's house style over decades to come. J. M. Synge died in Dublin in 1909, having suffered from Hodgkin's disease since 1897.