© Artistas Unidos, 2012
A one-act play, Riders to the Sea was written in the summer of 1902 and was first performed in Dublin in 1904. It draws directly on Synge’s experiences of four visits he made to Inis Meain (the middle island of the Aran Islands) between 1898 and 1901. Riders to the Sea distills into a compressed stage action Synge’s sensitivity towards the menace of death that he felt reach into the lives of the menfolk he met on the island, and concentrates this feeling in Maurya, who has lost her husband, father-in-law, and five sons to the sea. In dread of losing her sixth, Bartley, Maurya refuses her blessing when he leaves for a boat to a horse fair in Galway. Her daughters chide her for sending Bartley off with an ill word and send her after him to bless his voyage. During her absence, Nora and Cathleen receive clothing taken from a drowned corpse that was washed ashore in Donegal and identify them as their brother Michael's. Maurya returns home, claiming to have seen the ghost of Michael riding behind Bartley. Before long, the corpse of Bartley, who has fallen off his horse into the sea and drowned, is brought to the house by some villagers and the women begin their keening.
Elkin Mathews 1905
Translated into: Portuguese
Not applicable