The use of Irish Stereotype
The use of Irish StereotypeSean O’Casey’s plays mark the culmination of the European dramatic movement toward realism. O’Casey, along with his contemporaries William Butler Yeats and John Millington Synge, felt dramas of the time were too intellectualized (Hogan 45). With Juno and the Paycock, O’Casey tried to add local Irish color and preconceptions of the Irish to make his drama individualistic and realistic while ignoring formal dramatic technique (Ayling 89). He dispensed with an elaborate plot and was content to show Irish characters in action.
The story starts out as the main characters’s wife, Juno Boyle, is waiting for her husband, Captain Boyle, to come home from his morning visit to the pub. Mary Boyle, their daughter, and Juno discuss the newspaper account of the murder of Robbie Tancred, a fanatic Iris Republican. Jonny Boyle, Mary’s brother, who has been shot in the hip and had lost an arm fighting against the Free State, left the living roomafter complaining that the two women for their morbid insensitivity. Juno scolded Mary for participating in the Trades Union Strike, especially at a time when the family was in debt for food but Mary defended her activities, and her brother’s as well, as matters of principle.
When Jerry Devine, a tenant of the same house, rushed in with a message from Father Farrell, who had found a job for Boyle, Juno sent Jerry to look for her husband at his favorite bar. Soon afterward she heard her husband and his best friend, Joxer Daly, singing on the stairs. She hid behind the bed curtains so as to catch them talking about her. Disclosing herself, she frightened Joxer away and reprimanded her husband for his laziness. Jerry returned and delivered his message to Boyle, who immediately developed a case of stabbing pain in his legs. Jun, not deceived, ordered him to change into his work clothes. She then left for her own job.
Jerry accused Mary of being unfriendly and once again proposed to her. Although Jerry offered her love and security, Mary refused him and both left in a huff.
Ignoring his wife’s instructions to apply for the job, Boyle was rejoined by Joxer. Absorbed in their talk, they refused to acknowledge a loud knocking at the street door. The knocking seemed to annoy Jonny very much. Their ramblings on family life, the clergy, literature, and the sea was interrupted by Juno and Mary, who had returned with Charlie Bentham, a schoolteacher and amateur lawyer, to announce that a cousin had bequeathed a large sum of money to Boyle. Boyle declared that he was through with Joxer and the like, whereupon Joxer, who had been hiding ouside the window, reappered, expressed his indignation and left.
Two days later the two cronies had been reconciled, Joxer having served as Boyle’s agent for loans based on expectations of the inheritance. The entrance of Juno and Mary with a new gramophone was followed by that of Bentham, now Mary’s fiance....
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