The Silence of Barbara Synge

"Crucial events in the family's past are considered in the light of their influence on J.M. Synge's writing, from a suicide in 1769 which is echoed in one of his early plays, to the disastrous consequences of the Great Famine, which impacted upon Synge's composition of The Playboy of the Western World (1907)." "Mc Cormacks brings to life some colourful characters amonst the Synge ancestors, such as sometime MP Johan Hatch, and John 'Pestalozzi' Synge, whose religious and educational concerns seem to act as expiation of the family's earlier shortcomings and anxieties." "This volume provides a companion to Fool of the Family: A Life of J.M. Synge, W.J. Mc Cormack's acclaimed biography of Synge."--Jacket.