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Type of Work 
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.......The Playboy of the Western World is a comedy with satiric and tragic elements. Synge wanted his audience to laugh at his characters, but he also wanted the audience to notice their humanity—for they have their faults and defects. The people who frequent Flaherty’s country tavern are stuck in a boring corner of Ireland. But except for Christy Mahon, they do nothing to improve their lot. Even Pegeen Flaherty—an attractive and intelligent young woman who is full of spirit—fails to extricate herself from the humdrum life of rural Mayo County. The reader is led to believe at the end of the play that she will end up with the spineless lout Shawn Keough for her husband.

Meaning of the Word Playboy
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.......In early twentieth-century Ireland, playboy did not have the meaning it has today. Rather, it meant hoaxer or trickster. The widow Quin calls Christy Mahon “the playboy of the western world” after discovering that his father is still alive. Her epithet for him is, in effect, a euphemism for great liar or fraud, expressing her belief that he concocted the story about killing his father. However, playboy as the early twentyieth-century Irish used the word had a light-hearted, whimsical nuance to its meaning. So the Widow Quin is actually complimenting and condemning Christy at the same time. Christy, of course, is an accomplished trickster—or playboy—because of his gift for spinning a good tale. He is so convincing in his description of the “murder” that no one doubts his story until his “dead” father shows up. The title of a French version of the play, Le Beau-Parleur du vaste monde (which loosely translates as The World’s Greatest Storyteller), reflects the view that Christy is an ingenious trickster because of his talented tongue.

Setting
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.......The action takes place in the early 1900's in a rural tavern (called a public house, a pub, or a shebeen) along the Atlantic coast in County Mayo, Ireland. Among the major industries in County Mayo, located in Connacht province, are farming and fishing. The name Mayo is derived from the Gaelic words Maigh Eo (also spelled Mhaigh Eo), meaning the Plain of the Yews. 

Characters
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Christopher Mahon: Young man who claims to have murdered his father. At the beginning of the play, Christy is ordinary and undistinguished except in his ability to tell a good story—namely the story of how he killed his father. His tale turns him into a hero to his listeners. Their admiration for him improves his self-esteem. By the end of the play, he is a better man.  
Margaret Flaherty: Pretty, quick-witted pub owner's daughter who takes a fancy to Christy Mahon. Her friends call her Pegeen Mike, or simply Pegeen. She is a bit of a tragic figure at the end of the play, when Christy leaves her community without reconciling with her. 
Michael Flaherty: Father of Margaret (Pegeen) Flaherty and owner of the pub in which the action of the play takes place. He enjoys attending wakes (night-long viewings of corpses before funerals), where liquor and lively talk flow freely. During most of the onstage action of the play, he is offstage attending a wake with his friends.
Shawn Keough: Dull, spineless young farmer who has Michael Flaherty's approval to marry Margaret (Pegeen), his second cousin. She despises Shawn.
Philly Cullen, Jimmy Farrell: Friends of Michael Flaherty who attend the wake with him.
Widow Quin: Crafty, opportunistic 30-year-old who makes a play for Christy. According to rumors, her husband died by her hand. 
Sara Tansey, Susan Brady, Honor Blake: Girls who go gaga for Christy after hearing of his murderous talents.
Town Crier, Peasants, Farmers
Old Mahon: Christy Mahon's father. Thanks to his thick skull, he survives Christy's attempts to kill him. Although he has always looked down on his son, he comes to respect him at the end of the play after Christy reveals himself as a man of nerve and derring-do.
Father Reilly: Local Roman Catholic priest. He does not appear in the play, but his presence is nevertheless felt because of Shawn Keough's frequent references to him. Because Shawn is a relative (second cousin) of the object of his affection, Pegeen, he needs the approval of the Catholic Church to marry her. Therefore, Shawn is forever worrying about how his conduct will be perceived by Father Reilly, apparently a by-the-book cleric.
Kate Cassidy: Deceased local resident. It is her wake that Flaherty and his friends attend. 
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Plot Summary
By Michael J. Cummings...© 2005
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.......It is an autumn evening along the Irish coast in County Mayo. Shawn Keough stops at Michael James Flaherty’s country pub to visit Flaherty’s daughter, Margaret, called Pegeen Mike by her family and friends. Keough, a fat young fellow devoid of wit or talent, means to marry pretty Pegeen, a spirited colleen of twenty who is minding the tavern in her father’s absence. But she entertains no fancy for Shawn. When he pesters her about the “good bargain” she would have in becoming his wife, she tells him to stop tormenting her while she is doing her job.
.......Her father enters with Philly Cullen and Jimmy Farrell. They are on their way to Kate Cassidy’s wake. Flaherty and his friends enjoy wakes, which are among the few lively activities in the Mayo countryside, and they generally stay for the whole night to watch the corpse while imbibing spiritous glee.
.......Pegeen is upset about having to tend the pub alone. After all, who knows what evildoer might steal in from the shadows to set upon her. She complains, "It's a queer father'd be leaving me lonesome these twelve hours of dark, and I piling the turf [peat] with the dogs barking, and the calves mooing, and my own teeth rattling with the fear."
.......When Flaherty suggests that Keough keep her company, Shawn begs off, saying he would incur the wrath of Father Reilly for staying alone with her the whole night. By and by, a slight young fellow named Christy Mahon stumbles in, tired and dirty, and asks for a glass of porter. When he inquires whether the police frequent the establishment, Michael Flaherty thinks he might be on the run. Flaherty and his friends question Christy. Did he commit larceny? Did he stalk a young girl? Did he fail to pay his rent? Is he a counterfeiter? Does he have three wives? 
.......Christy, who speaks in a wee voice, says he is the son of a well-to-do farmer and therefore has no need of money. And, says he, he is a decent fellow who would never do wrong to a woman. When Flaherty and the others continue to pump Christy, Pegeen comes to his defense: "You did nothing at all. A soft lad the like of you wouldn't slit the windpipe of a screeching sow." But Christy balks at that observation, as if she had accused him of not being man enough to commit a crime. Then he reveals that he is indeed on the run, for he has killed his father, who was “getting old and crusty, the way I couldn't put up with him at all.” 
.......Flaherty, intrigued, motions for Pegeen to refill Christy's glass, then asks Christy how he did the deed. Christy says, "I just riz [raised] the loy [club] and let fall the edge of it on the ridge of his skull, and he went down at my feet like an empty sack, and
never let a grunt or groan from him at all."
.......After he buried him, he hit the road, walking for eleven days, “facing hog, dog, or divil. . . .”  Jimmy Farrell praises him for his bravery, and Pegeen joins in: "It's the truth they're saying, and if I'd that lad in the house, I wouldn't be fearing the . . . cut-throats, or the walking dead."

Christy Proud

.......Christy swells with pride, and Flaherty offers him a job in the tavern. Keough objects, but Pegeen silences him. Christy, feeling safe and welcome, decides to stay at least for the night. Jimmy Farrell says, "Now, by the grace of God, herself [Pegeen] will be safe this night, with a man killed his father holding danger from the door, and let you come on, Michael James, or they'll have the best stuff drunk at the wake."
.......After Flaherty, Farrell, and Philly Cullen leave, Shawn Keough—jealous—offers to stay with Pegeen, but she pushes him out the door and bolts it. Pegeen now has a brave man, a hero, to protect her, and she and Christy warm to each other, exchanging compliments about their looks and other qualities. 
.......Meanwhile, the Widow Quin, a woman of about thirty, stops by after hearing from Keough about Pegeen’s visitor. Widow Quin is locally famous for reportedly having murdered her husband. Eyeing Christy, she says, “Well, aren't you a little smiling fellow? It should have been great and bitter torments did rouse your spirits to a deed of blood.”
.......She wants to take Christy with her to her place. Pegeen tells Christy that the widow killed her husband “with a worn pick, and the rusted poison did corrode his blood the way he never overed [got over] it, and died after. That was a sneaky kind of murder did win small glory with the boys itself.” Mrs. Quin retorts that a woman who has buried her children and murdered her husband is a better match for Christy than a girl the like of Pegeen. But Pegeen fends her off, for she is determined to keep Christy for herself.
.......In the morning, three village girls—Sara Tansey, Susan Brady, and Honor Blake—come by the tavern with gifts for the brave man that killed his father. Sara has duck eggs, Susan has butter, and Honor has cake. Widow Quin enters after them, saying she has registered Christy in a local athletic competition featuring racing, leaping, and pitching. At the women’s prompting, Christy tells his murder story.
.......He first points out that his father tried to make him marry the Widow Casey, a 45-year-old “walking terror” who weighed 205 pounds, had a bad leg and a blind eye, pursued both young and old men, and suckled him after he was born. When he refused to marry her, his father swung at him with his scythe. “I gave a lep to the east," says Christy. "Then I turned around with my back to the north, and I hit a blow on the ridge of his skull, laid him stretched out, and he split to the knob of his gullet." 
.......Pegeen comes in, well knowing what the women are up to, and chases them off. Later, Shawn Keough comes back, followed by Widow Quin, to tell Pegeen some of her sheep have strayed into a neighbor’s field to eat cabbage. While Pegeen runs off to fetch the sheep, Keough offers Christy a new hat and coat, as well as breeches and ticket to the western states, if he will just go away so that Shawn can resume courting Pegeen. The widow butts in, telling Christy to try the clothes on. He can decide later, she says, whether to accept Keough’s offer. When Christy goes into another room to try them on, Keough tells the widow he thinks that Christy is just dressing up for Pegeen and has no intention to leave. 
.......The widow then offers Shawn a bargain of her own: Shawn must give her his red cow, a ram, the right-of-way across his rye path, and a load of dung at Michaelmas. Shawn not only agrees to her demands but also says he will throw in a wedding ring, a suit for Christy for the wedding day, and various wedding gifts, including two goats for the wedding dinner. 
.......After Christy comes back out wearing the new clothes, Shawn leaves so the widow can go to work on Christy. But Christy, spying a fearsome sight coming toward the pub, hides behind a door. It is his father, still alive! After old Mahon enters the pub, he asks Mrs. Quin whether she has seen a young man on the run. She tells him hundreds pass by each day to catch the Sligo boat, then asks why he is looking for him. Mahon says, "I want to destroy him for breaking the head on me with the clout of a loy. (He takes off a big hat, and shows his head in a mass of bandages and plaster, with some pride.) It was he did that, and amn't I a great wonder to think I've traced him ten days with that rent in my crown?"
.......The villain, he says, is his own son. When the widow—who is able to see Christy behind the door—questions old Mahon about his son, Mahon says his son is a good-for-nothing lout who is afraid of women, gets drunk on the mere smell of liquor, and once required medical treatment for drawing on a pipe of tobacco. He’s “dark and dirty,” says the old man, “an ugly young blackguard.”
.......Widow Quin tells him she did see such a young man on his way to catch a steamer. She then gives him directions that send him on a wild-goose chase. After old Mahon leaves, the widow scolds Christy, mildly, for pretending to be the Playboy of the Western World. Then she invites him to marry her and live in her house, where she will protect him from inquiries about whether he committed murder. 
.......Outside, young ladies are calling for Christy. They want to escort him to the sporting competitions. Christy, meanwhile, tells the widow he has his heart set on Pegeen. He would be forever in the widow’s debt if she helped him win Pegeen. The widow says she will if he promises to give her a ram, a load of dung at Michaelmas, and a right-of-way across land. Christy promises to do so. 
.......Later in the day, Jimmy and Philly return from the wake, both tipsy, and enter the tavern. They speculate about how Christy killed his father and buried him, wondering what will happen if someone discovers the old man’s bones. While they are talking, Old Mahon comes in and sits at a table, for he has had no luck finding Christy. Continuing his conversation with Philly, Jimmy says that when he was a boy he found the bones of a man in a graveyard and tried to put them together like a puzzle. What a sight those bones were, Jimmy says—one would never again find the like of them. Overhearing that part of the conversation, old Mahon gets up and shows them his skull, saying, “Tell me where and when there was another the like of it.” He tells them it was his own son who struck him. 
.......They are impressed—but unaware that Mahon is Christy’s father. The window Quin comes in again, aghast to see old Mahon. He tells her he had no luck tracking down his son. Mrs. Quin gives him a drink and seats him out of earshot of the others. Then she tells Jimmy and Philly that old Mahon is daft. It was a tinker who split his skull, she says, but the old Man—upon hearing about the local hero, Christy—claims it was Christy who did it. They believe her.
.......Cheering is heard. Everyone in the tavern looks out the window and sees Christy winning the mule race. When the spectators raise him onto their shoulders, old Mahon identifies him as his good-for-nothing son. Widow Quin pronounces Mahon mad for thinking so, for how could his son—if he is the fool that Mahon says he is—be such a great sportsman and win the admiration of so many people? Mahon admits he has not been himself lately: "There was one time I seen ten scarlet divils letting on they'd cork my spirit in a gallon can; and one time I seen rats as big as badgers sucking the life blood from the butt of my lug."
.......The widow tells him he’d best leave, for the lads in the crowd don’t take kindly to madmen. When he goes on his way, Philly goes with him, saying he will give the old fellow some supper and a place to rest, then check to see if he is as mad as the widow says.
Meanwhile, with the continuing cheers of the crowd following him, Christy enters the tavern in his jockey’s uniform with Pegeen and other girls. The people present him prizes, including bagpipes and a fiddle. Christy, riding the glory of the moment, asks Pegeen to marry him, and she consents. 

Michael Flaherty Returns

.......Michael Flaherty returns then from the wake and congratulates Christy for his great victory in the race. When Pegeen tells him she plans to marry Christy, her father at first objects. But moments later, when Shawn Keough is afraid to fight Christy for Pegeen, old Flaherty renounces Keough as a coward and welcomes Christy as his daughter’s future husband. 
.......Then old Mahon returns with a club, reveals himself as Christy’s father, and begins beating Christy. The crowd then turns on Christy for posing as a murderer. Even Pegeen condemns him, saying, "And to think of the coaxing glory we had given him, and he after doing nothing but hitting a soft blow and chasing northward in a sweat of fear." 
.......Christy has only one option—to kill his father again. The two men fight. Christy grabs the club and chases Old Mahon outside. In the center of the crowd, Christy brings down the club. There is a cry, then dead silence. Christy returns to the tavern in a daze. This time the crowd, having witnessed a real murder close up, is horrified at the deed. Pegeen says: 
......."I'll say, a strange man is a marvel, with his mighty talk; but what's a squabble in your back-yard, and the blow of a loy, have taught me that there's a great gap between a gallous story and a dirty deed." 
.......After the people tie Christy up, he asks Pegeen to release him, but she refuses. Then they burn his leg with sod. A moment later, though, old Mahon—wonder of wonders—comes back from the dead one more time. When he asks Christy why he is tied up, Christy says, "They're taking me to the peelers [police] to have me hanged for slaying you."
.......Old Mahon, who now admires his son for his bravery, unties him and says, “My son and myself will be going our own way, and we'll have great times from this out telling stories of the villainy of Mayo, and the fools is here."
.......Christy willingly goes along but declares that henceforth he will be master of the house. He is a changed man—confident now, self-assured.
.......Shawn Keough declares that a miracle has been worked in his favor. Now, he says, he can marry Pegeen. She boxes his ears and tells him to go away. Then, throwing a shawl over her head and weeping, she says, “Oh my grief, I've lost him surely. I've lost the only Playboy of the Western World.”
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Climax
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.......The climax of a play or another literary work, such as a short story or a novel, can be defined as (1) the turning point at which the conflict begins to resolve itself for better or worse, or as (2) the final and most exciting event in a series of events. The climax of The Playboy of the Western World occurs when the local residents discover that Christy's father is still alive. According to the second definition, the climax occurs when Christy "kills" his father a second time but reconciles with him after the old man recovers.
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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 also from herds and fishermen along the coast from Kerry to Mayo, or from beggar-women and balladsingers nearer Dublin; and I am glad to acknowledge how much I owe to the folk imagination of these fine people.  Anyone who has lived in real intimacy with the Irish peasantry will know that the wildest sayings and ideas in this play are tame indeed, compared with the fancies one may hear in any little hillside cabin in Geesala, or Carraroe, or Dingle Bay. All art is a collaboration; and there is little doubt that in the happy ages of literature, striking and beautiful phrases were as ready to the story-teller's or the playwright's hand, as the rich cloaks and dresses of his time. It is probable that when the Elizabethan dramatist took his ink-horn and sat down to his work he used many phrases that he had just heard, as he sat at dinner, from his mother or his children.  In Ireland, those of us who know the people have the same privilege.

• Why does Christy readily tell strangers that he killed his father?
• Did Christy's father have a good reason for being cranky with his son?
• Shawn Keough appears to have no commendable qualities—no wit, no talent, no courage. Does he have anything in common with Christy Mahon?
• To what extent is the humor in the play a result of the way the characters speak rather than what they say?
• The custom of holding wakes has a long history in Ireland. Write an expository essay outlining the history and development of Irish wakes. 
• What accounts for Old Mahon's acceptance of his son at the end of the play?
• Why does Christy go home with his father instead of remaining and marrying Pegeen?