Sean O’Casey

‘Juno and the Paycock’

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An Overview of Juno and the Paycock

Play’s Background

Settings

Plot

Characters

Writer’s Life and Work

The Play and its Social Significance

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Background to the play

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‘Juno and the Paycock’ is set in the 1920’s during the Irish Civil War between

•the Republicans (Diehards), who wanted a united Ireland, and

•the Free Staters, who were happy with Ireland being partitioned.

•The Free Staters accepted the Government of Ireland Act of 1920, which established the Free State of the 26 counties. Six counties remained under British rule and this was known as Northern Ireland.

Background to the play

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This Civil War lasted until 1923 and was bloody and terrible.

Families and neighbours fought against each other and many lost their lives.

This situation is reflected in the play and its pointlessness is highlighted through the characters.

This futility is made all the more poignant through references to past romantic heroes and glorious episodes in Ireland’s past.

Setting

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‘The living-room of a two-room tenancy occupied by the Boyle family in a tenement house in Dublin’

Cramped living conditions

Poverty

Lacks privacy

Irish historical background

Johnny: ‘Oul’ Simon Mackay is Thrampin’ about like a horse over me head,’

(They all share just two rooms)

Johnny: ’Can’t you do it then, without letting the whole house know you’re taking off your trousers.’

Mrs Boyle: He wore out the Health Insurance long ago, he’s afther wearin’ out the unemployment dole,

Various references to the fighting, Diehards, the Free State etc.

From the opening sentence of the play, an impression is formed of the family’s living conditions. These ideas are supported further on in Act 1 Scene 1

Setting

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‘Between the window and the dresser is a picture of the virgin; below the picture, on a bracket, is a crimson bowl in which a floating light is burning’

Idea of religion introduced

Mary: “The full details are in it this mornin’; seven wounds he had-one entherin’ the neck, with an exit wound beneath the left shoulder blade; another in the left breast penethratin’ the heart, an’..”

Idea of Violence introduced

Rundown house

Old sofa

AnchorHanging

clothes

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Plot

Four main strands are introduced in Act 1 and develop throughout the play

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Plot Development Strands

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Characters

Juno Boyle Mary Johnny

Minor characters Bentham Joxer Jerry Mrs Tancred

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‘Captain’ Boyle

A lot of energy Light-hearted tone You think you know it all Act as though you have to explain everything to

Mrs. Boyle Avoid conflict in scene at all costs

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Mrs. Juno Boyle

Smart woman with strong opinions; (act like your opinion matters)

Let Mr. Boyle talk, accept that he’ll say something stupid

Caring towards children (Be concerned with Mary’s flirtatiousness and Johnny’s hallucination)

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Charles Bentham

Embodies the player/lady’s man persona

Has sneaky eyes

Well spoken and confident

Dresses well

Refined and seemingly above these people

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Mary Boyle

Shallow, vain way of speaking

Judgmental looks towards everyone

Is completely absorbed in flirting with Bentham, uninterested in political and religious talk

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Johnny Boyle

Acts uneasy, paces often, shifty eyes

When topic of ghosts comes up, gets defensive and stutters through lines

Pure horror at “sight” of Tancred; he sees it, no one else does

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Writer’s Life and Works

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• 1880 — 30 March: Born John Casey in Dublin, the youngest child of a respectable Protestant clerk.

• 1886 — His father died, he became deeply devoted to his mother.

• 1894 — Sent to work at fourteen

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Sean O’Casey (1880-1964)

• 1906— Involved himself with Nationalist movements, as Secretary of the Irish-speaking Gaelic League and a member of the Irish Republican brotherhood.

• 1920—At forty, left home for the first time, disgusted by his brother's drinking.

• 1919—His mother died. The Abbey rejected his first play

• 1924— Juno and the Paycock was an unprecedented success at the Abbey. O'Casey was still a labourer, mixing concrete. 

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Sean O’Casey (1880-1964)

• 1927 –Married actress Eileen Carey Reynolds (who played Nora in The Plough and the Stars in London).

• 1930 –Film of Juno and the Paycock, directed by Alfred Hitchcock, released. Copy of the film burned in the street by Irish nationalists in Limerick.

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• 1964 Lifted ban on Irish productions so

that The Abbey could present Juno and the Paycock in the World Theatre Season in London.

18 September: died in Torbay. In his later years, O'Casey ceased

writing for the stage and put all his creative energy into his highly entertaining and interesting six-volume Autobiography.

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Sean O’Casey (1880-1964)

• 13th child in a Protestant family

• Grim childhood, poor eye sight, and ill health

• Father—a clerkMother—raised her children alone after O’Casey’s father died

• Two of his most appealing characters are created by his mother’s image.

• The first Irish playwright to write about the Dublin working classes.

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Sean O’Casey’s Plays and Works

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Sean O’Casey’s Plays

• Early in his adult life — Gaelic League and the amateur theatre movement

• Early forties — quick succession of three realistic plays about the slums of Dublin: The Shadow of a Gunman, Juno and the Paycock, and The Plough and the Stars.

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These three plays provoked public outcry mainly because of O'Casey's consistent refusal to glorify the violence of the nationalist movement, instead mocking the heroics of war and presenting the theme that dead heroes were far outnumbered by dead innocent people.

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"All the world's a stage and most of us are desperately unrehearsed." --Sean O’Casey

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Sean O’Casey’s Works

• Juno and the Paycock (1924) and The Plough and the Stars (1926), probably O'Casey's two finest plays. Both deal with the impact of the Irish Civil War on the working class poor of the city.

• Juno and the Paycock was successfully filmed by Alfred Hitchcock.

• In 1959 O'Casey gave his blessing to a musical adaptation of the play by American composer Marc Blitzstein. The musical, retitled Juno.

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The Play and it’s Social Significance

Society

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Juno and the Paycock• The paycock, or peacock represents the chaos that Juno endures

during the play.

• In mythology, the name Juno is the Roman name for Hera, the goddess of marriage, and the peacock is her symbol.

• The Boyle family: - a working class family in their attempt to escape their dilemmas- alienated from each other

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Women in Juno and the Paycock

Juno Boyle- Breadwinner

- Realist in the family

- Showing her strength in adversity

Mary Boyle - On strike for her principles

- Blinded by appearances

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Men in Juno and the Paycock

Jack Boyle - Idleness, a real cripple in life

“Mary is always readin’ lately – nothing but trash, too..” (440)

“I’m hardly able to crawl with the pains in me legs!” (440)

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Men in Juno and the Paycock

Jack Boyle

- Self-deception, talking with a commanding and complacent gesture

e.g. “Chiselurs don’t care a damn now about their parents, they’re bringin’ their fathers’ gray hairs down with sorra to the grave, an’ laughin’ at it, laughin’ at it.” (440)

e.g. “Captain’s able to take care of himself…” (441)

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Men in Juno and the PaycockJohnny Boyle- Suffering from his

betrayal to his comrade

- Showing no sympathy to his sister

Joxer Daly

- Parasite- Crawler

Jerry Devine - Judging love from

material things- Turing his back on

Mary when knowing she’s having Bentham’s baby

Charlie Bentham

- Bring fantasy and disillusion to the Boyle family

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Mothers in Juno and the Paycock

while facing the death of their sons: Mrs. Tancred - despairing and anticipates her own death

“O Blessed Virgin where were you when me darlin’ son was riddled with bullets,…” (449)

Juno Boyle - hardy and resolute

“Ah, what can God do agen the stupidity o’ men!” (457)

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