Chief characteristics of the one-act play

1. Brief Historical Survey

           One-Act plays were written & staged throughout the 18th & 19th centuries as “The Curtain
Raisers” or “The After Pieces”.
         They were chiefly farcical & served to amuse the audience before the commencement of the
actual drama or were staged for their amusement just after it had come to an end.
         The famous one-act play “Monkey’s Paw” was first staged as a ‘Curtain Raiser’ & it proved to
be more entertaining than the main drama. It may be said to mark the beginning of the modern one-
act play.
         The origin of the one-act play may be traced to the very beginning of drama —- in ancient
Greece, Cyclops, a play on the forest God , by Euripides, is an early example.
        It was great Norwegian dramatist Ibsen, who, for the first time, introduced the minute stage-
directions into the one-act play. Before him, one-act plays were written in poetry, but he made prose
the medium of his one-act plays. In short, he made the drama, simple & real , & brought it nearer to
everyday life. He made the modern one-act play what it is & his example has been widely followed.
George Bernard Shaw & John Galsworthy are two of his greatest followers.
         The one-act play requires no elaborate setting & costumes, & so comes in handy to be staged in
amateur dramatic societies & clubs.
          One-act plays by major dramatists —–
 (i)  Anton Chekhov —– A Marriage Proposal (1890)
 (ii) August Strindberg —–Pariah (1889)
                                        Motherly Love (1892)
                                        The First Warning (1892)
 (iii) Thornton Wilder —-The Long Christmas Dinner (1931)
 (iv) Eugene Ionesco —- The Bald Soprano (1950)
 (v)  Arthur Miller —-A Memory of Two Mondays (1955)
 (vi) Samuel Beckett —- Krapp’s Last Tape (1958)
 (vii) Israel Horovitz —-Line (1974)
 (viii) Edward Albee —- The Goat, or Who is Sylvia? (2002)
2. Chief Characteristics

(i) One-act play is a play that has only one act, but may consist of one or more scenes.

(ii) One-act plays are usually written in a concise manner.

(iii) It deals with a single dominant situation, & aims at producing a single effect.

(iv) It deals with only one theme developed through one situation to one climax in order to produce

the maximum of effect.

(v) It treats the problems of everyday life as marriage,                         punishment for crimes, labor

conditions, divorce, etc.

(vi) The one-act play, like the longer drama, should have a                  beginning, a middle & an end.

It may be divided into four stages : The Exposition, The Conflict, The Climax & The Denouement.

                   The exposition is usually brief, serves as an           introduction to the play.

                    It is through the conflict that the action of the                  drama develops. It is the very

backbone of the one-act play.

                    Climax is the turning point of the drama. It                 is an important part of the one-act

play & constitutes its moment    of supreme interest.

                    The Denouement is very brief & often overlaps                with climax.

(vii) Action begins right at the start of the play.

(viii) There are no breaks in the action, that is , it is continuous       since its a short play; no intervals.

(ix) Everything superfluous is to be strictly avoided as the play is short & the action takes place

within a short period of time. It introduces elaborate stage directions to minimize the time taken by

the action itself.

(x) The creation of mood, or atmosphere is indispensable to its success.

(xi) There are three dramatic unities which are observed in the one-act play. The unities are —- the

unity of time, unity of place & the unity of action.

(xii) It aims at simplicity of plot ; concentration of action & unity of impression. It does not rely on

spectacular effects & common dramatic tricks of old.

(xiii) The characters in a one-act play are limited in number. Generally, there are not more than two

or three principal characters.

(xiv) There is no full development of character. All the different aspects of a character are not

presented. The attention is focused on only one or two salient aspects of character & they are brought

out by placing the characters in different situations & circumstances. The author implies the past &

intimates the future of a character by presenting a crucial moment in the life of that character.

(xv) There is an influence of realism. The characters in the modern one-act play are ordinary men &

women. It depicts characters that seems to be real & related to everyday life.

(xvi) It must present a question, for which the audience eagerly awaits the answer.

(xvii) Its language is simple & can be followed without any strain. All superfluity is to be avoided in

the dialogue. The dialogue must be purposeful; the best dialogue is that which does several things at

one time. Every word is to be carefully chosen & sentences must be compact & condensed. Effort

should be made to say, whatever is to be said, in the least possible words. Thus, the language of the

dialogue should be simple , brief & easy to understand . Long speeches & arguments & long

sentences would be out of place & would lessen the charm & interest of the play.

J. M. Synge

 Synge was the youngest of five children, and his father died of smallpox just a year after

he was born.
 Despite his mother’s religious fervor, Synge began moving towards agnosticism after

reading Darwin.

 He attended Trinity College and the Royal Irish Academy of Music, and (despite

performing poorly) he cultivated an interest in Irish literature.

 Synge began writing poetry and spent several years abroad in Germany, Paris, and Italy

studying music.

 In Paris, he was introduced to the renowned writer William Butler Yeats and he was

inspired by Yeats’ passion for the Irish Literary Renaissance, a literary movement

associated with an increased interest in Irish language and culture.

 Synge would go on to write poetry, plays, and articles that focused on the Irish culture

and peasantry, and though he wrote in English, his writing contained the music of Irish

speech patterns. Eventually Synge became one of the three directors of the Irish

National Theatre Society, along with Yeats and Lady Isabella Gregory.

 He suffered from cancer of the lymphatic glands beginning in 1897 and would die from

the disease in 1909 in Dublin.

Riders To The Sea

Synge's one-act play Riders to the Sea (1904) deals with the lives and manners of a cross-
section of humanity. While the play is concerned with local matters, Synge represents these
matters with a universal interest. In other words, Synge, like many great writers such as Thomas
Hardy, universalizes the experience of a particular individual or a group of individuals. Synge
focuses our attention upon that aspect of life that absorbs the interest of humanity in general; his
play has a timeless appeal because its content draws attention to something that is essentially
human. The relevance of Riders to the Sea lies in its intensity of appeal and in its sense of
contemporaneity.

At the urging of his friend William Butler Yeats, Synge had traveled to spend a few days in the
Aran Islands to study the lives of their people. Synge was attracted to the way of life of Aran
islanders; when he heard a story of a body of a man washed up on the island of Inishmaan, he
decided to frame the story and the experiences of the commoners as a play. Thus Riders to the
Sea  was born.

There are two themes working parallel to each other in this play. One is the sea, the theme that
grounds all of the play's proceedings. The other is omen and foreboding, and the readers can
predict from the title that something ominous is going to happen regarding to the sea. From the
very beginning, we see Maurya, the protagonist, talking about her sons who sacrificed their
lives to the seas; the whole play revolves around fears concerning the sea. Maurya also believes
in omens: when Bartley, Maurya's only living son, leaves their house without her blessing,
Maurya has a terrible vision and soon learns of Bartley’s death at sea. In this way, the two
themes amalgamate with each other and create a perfect setting for Riders to the Sea.

The play was first performed by the Irish National Theatre Company at Molesworth Hall,
Dublin, on February 25th, 1904. The few attendees enjoyed the play, but the critical response
was mixed (interestingly, it was the only play of Synge's that was not attacked by audience
members during his lifetime). When it traveled to London the next month and to other countries
in subsequent years it received a warmer welcome; Yeats said “Synge’s foreign success is worth
more to us than would be the success of any other of our people.” The play would actually grow
in estimation in the eyes of Irish critics over time.

British composer Ralph Vaughn Williams adapted the play into an opera in 1925. The libretto
was in English, which was rare at the time. It was performed first on November 30th, 1937 at the
Royal College of Music in London. There have been a least three other operas written and
performed that take the play as its subject. There are also two films, one produced in 1935
(Synge’s own bereaved fiancée acted in it) and the other in 1987.
Character List
Maurya
Maurya has given birth to six sons during her life on the coastal island lying of at the mouth of
Ireland's Galway Bay. Four of them are already dead, along with their father and grandfather.
She is old and poor and fears that the extended and uncharacteristic absence of her son Michael
means he is about to added to the list of her deceased loved ones. As if worrying that Michael
has drowned weren't enough stress, she also doesn’t appear to be very successful at persuading
her other remaining son, Bartley, from crossing over to the mainland in a bid to deal away a
couple of horses. In the end, Maurya has only her daughters to help with the cold comfort of
knowing that there are no more men in her life for the sea to take from her. She feels at last a
sense of peace and serenity now that her greatest anxiety has been lifted.
Bartley
Bartley is the youngest of Maurya’s six sons; when Michael’s death is confirmed, he steps up to
become the family's sole financial support. His means of supporting the family is what gives the
play its title: he rides horses out to sea and to the steamer ship, which must lay anchored far
offshore; the horses are sold at a fair on the mainland. Maurya refuses to give Bartley her
blessing after having a vision of his impending death.
Cathleen
Cathleen is the eldest of Maurya’s daughter. Cathleen is 20 years old; she commiserates with
Bartley’s position and is scornful of her mother’s superstitions. In contrast to the somewhat
mystical bent of her mother, who is given to lamentations and omens, Cathleen is pure
practicality in action, which is a great necessity when living with someone like Maurya.
Nora
The youngest member of the clan, Nora is much more patient with mother’s penchant for self-
pity than her oldest sister is. At the same time, she provides a great sounding board for Cathleen
to express her contrarian views.
The Priest
The priest is never actually seen on stage, but his presence is so vital to the story that he must be
considered at least as important a character as Nora. It is the priest who delivers the message
through Nora that Maurya must put her faith and trust in a God that would never allow every last
one of her sons to die while she is still alive. He is younger and more modern than Maurya.

Summary

Riders to the Sea by Irish playwright John Millington Synge, performed in 1904 in
Dublin, is a one-act tragedy set on the Aran Islands in Inishmaan. It focuses on the
grieving Irishwoman Maurya, who has lost her husband and five of her sons to the
sea. When she gets word that one of her sons’ bodies may have been found, it sets
into motion a chain of events that lead to further tragedy for the old widow and her
surviving children. Written in the traditional Hyberno-English of the Aran Islands, it
is considered a classic work of the Irish Literary Renaissance, when Irish literature
aimed to encourage pride and nationalism in Ireland. It celebrates the hardiness of
Irish people, and its central conflict is that of man against nature. There is no
human antagonist—the primary antagonist is the impersonal, cruel sea that takes
away so many family members. There is a deeply religious theme in the play as
well, informed by Ireland’s Roman Catholic tradition. Riders to the Sea has been
adapted twice into film, most recently in 1987, and has been adapted into opera
and dance performances.

Riders to the Sea begins on the Aran Islands, as Nora, a young woman, brings in a
small bundle and tells her older sister, Cathleen, that they may be the clothes of
their drowned brother Michael. A priest told her the body of a drowned man had
been found, but they do not want their mother, Maurya to know. Michael has been
missing for a week; the family has already lost the family patriarch as well as four
other sons to the sea. They hide the bundle in the turf loft of the cottage. Maurya is
busy planning for Michael’s funeral, consumed by her grief and lamenting that she
has lost all her sons to the sea. She discusses the last remaining son, Bartley, with
her daughters. Bartley is planning to go to sea to sell the family horses. Nora and
Cathleen think they need the money, but Maurya is hoping that the priest will stop
him due to the dangerous tides.
Bartley enters the cottage looking for rope. Maurya tries to stop him, but he is
determined to create a halter for the horses for his trip. Maurya tries to dissuade
him by showing him the preparations for Michael’s funeral, but he ignores her. He
says goodbye to his sisters, but his mother refuses to give him any blessings as he
leaves. This is significant as it is an Irish tradition that a son receives the blessing of
his mother before he leaves. Maurya’s daughters are shocked she broke this
tradition. As Bartley leaves with the horses, Cathleen notices that he has taken no
food and sends Maurya after him to give him food and blessings. She leaves with a
stick from Michael, lamenting over how the old people never leave anything behind
for the young people in the family, as is customary. When Maurya is gone, her
daughters retrieve the bundle of clothes from the loft to check if they are from
Michael. Nora observes her own stitching on the clothing, and confirms that they
are her brother’s. They now know that their brother’s body has been found and the
priest has already buried him.

The sisters hide the clothes again, and they assume Maurya will be in a better
mood because she got the chance to bless Bartley. However, she comes back in a
panic, saying she saw Michael upon a grey pony. She could not bless Bartley due to
the shock. The girls try to calm her down by showing her Michael’s clothes and
telling her that her son got a proper Christian burial. As she grieves, villagers come
into the cottage, carrying Bartley’s body. The pony Maurya saw, that she thought
she saw Michael upon, knocked Bartley into the sea where he drowned. Maurya
gets on her knees near Bartley’s corpse and sprinkles him with holy water. She says
she is resigned to her fate and can finally sleep at night. After all, the sea has
claimed every man in her family, and it can take nothing more from her. The
preparations for Michael’s funeral will now be used for Bartley’s. The play ends with
Maurya praying that her husband, his father, and her four sons will rest in peace.
The curtain falls on her prayer.

John Millington Synge was a renowned Irish playwright and one of the co-founders
of the famed Abbey Theatre in Dublin. The author of nine plays in his short, 38-year
lifetime, he is best known for his controversial work The Playboy of the Western
World, which caused riots upon its debut in Dublin due to its controversial themes
which Irish nationalists viewed as an insult against national pride. Although he
came from a privileged background, most of his works were based on the world of
Irish peasants in the rural areas of the country. Many of his plays are still studied in
Irish literature courses today, and his cottage in the Aran Islands has become a
tourist attraction. He is considered a major influence on the famed Irish novelist
Samuel Beckett