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""The Playboy of the Western World"" is a play written by Irish playwright John M. Synge. Set in a small village on the west coast of Ireland, the play tells the story of Christy Mahon, a young man who arrives in the village claiming to have killed his father. His tale of patricide... Read Full Overview

"There is no language like the Irish for soothing and quieting."

The Playboy of the Western World is a three-act play written by John Millington Synge and first performed at the Abbey Theatre. The play tells the story of Christy Mahon, a young man running away from his... Read Full Overview

When The Playboy of the Western World was first performed in Ireland in 1907, the play prompted a series of riots in response to its treatment of the Irish working class and the controversial glorification of the morally questionable main character, Christy Mahon, who stumbles... Read Full Overview

This revised edition of the play is published alongside commentary and notes by Christopher Collins, Assistant Professor of Drama at the University of Nottingham, UK. It includes information for today's students on the play's context; themes; dramatic devices; production history;... Read Full Overview

THE PLAYBOY OF THE WESTERN WORLD was first produced by the National Theatre Society, Ltd., at the Abbey Theatre in Dublin, Ireland on Saturday, 26th January, 1907. Set in the West of Ireland it captures a time that no longer exists. A wonderful play that has been performed all... Read Full Overview

John Millington Synge's classic work set in Mayo. A mysterious traveller, Christy Mahon, arrives in the village believing he has killed his father. He is looked upon as a hero by the locals and falls in love with one of them, Pegeen Mike, who agrees to marry him. But when Christy's... Read Full Overview

The best known of all Irish plays.

The Playboy of the Western World by Irish playwright John Millington Synge is a three-act play written and performed at the Abbey Theatre, Dublin, on 26 January 1907.Any profits generated from the sale of this book will go towards the Freeriver Community project, a project designed... Read Full Overview

In writing THE PLAYBOY OF THE WESTERN WORLD, as in my other plays, I have used one or two words only that I have not heard among the country people of Ireland, or spoken in my own nursery before I could read the newspapers. A certain number of the phrases I employ I have heard... Read Full Overview

Synge, who came from a middle-class Protestant family near Dublin, created a huge scandal at the Abbey Theatre in Dublin, where The Playboy was staged in 1907, because its audience did not take kindly to a comedy that seemed to portray the Irish as violent, superstitious sots... Read Full Overview

When young Christy Mahon flees from his family's farm and tells the townspeople he killed his father, they respond in a way he did not expect. After an intense fight with his father, young Christy Mahon flees from his family's farm to tell the townspeople what he had... Read Full Overview

The Playboy of the Western World is a play written by John M. Synge, first performed in 1907. The story is set in a small village on the west coast of Ireland and follows the character of Christy Mahon, a young man who arrives in the village claiming to have killed his father... Read Full Overview

J.M. Synge wrote The Playboy of the Western World in 1907, to be produced at Ireland's Abbey Theatre, which he had helped to form. Though it is today one of the English-language drama's most widely-anthologized works, it was hardly a success at the time. In fact, the play was... Read Full Overview