Question

Riders to the sea

Accepted Answer

Riders to the Sea is a play written by Irish Literary Renaissance playwright John Millington Synge. It was first performed on 25 February 1904 at the Molesworth Hall, Dublin, by the Irish National Theater Society with Helen Laird playing Maurya. A one-act tragedy, the play is set in the Aran Islands, Inishmaan, and like all of Synge's plays it is noted for capturing the poetic dialogue of rural Ireland. The plot is based not on the traditional conflict of human wills but on the hopeless struggle of a people against the impersonal but relentless cruelty of the sea.

Sara Allgood as Maurya, photo taken by Carl Van Vechten, 1938
Background
In 1897, J. M. Synge was encouraged by his friend and colleague William Butler Yeats to visit the Aran Islands. He went on to spend the summers from 1898 to 1903 there. While on the Aran island of Inishmaan, Synge heard the story of a man from Inishmaan whose body washed up on the shore of an island of County Donegal, which inspired Riders to the Sea.

Riders to the Sea is written in the Hiberno-English dialect of the Aran Islands. Synge's use of the native Irish language is part of the Irish Literary Revival, a period when Irish literature looked to encourage pride and nationalism in Ireland.

Several scenes in the play are taken from stories Synge collected during his time in the Aran Islands and recorded in his book The Aran Islands. These include the identifying of the drowned man by his clothing and the account of a man's ghost being seen riding a horse.

Aran Irish Riders Sea Play Synge Islands Written