In the Shadow of the Glen

Name: In the Shadow of the Glen
Author: J. M. Synge

by J. M. Synge

Pages: about 19
Category: Literature & Fiction
Language: English
Reading time: 21 min at 250 wpm

Start readingThe whole book, as cards or one word at a time. 12 min at 450 wpm in Read mode.

From the opening

DAN BURKE (farmer and herd) George Roberts NORA BURKE (his wife) Maire Nic Shiubhlaigh MICHEAL DARA (a young herd) P. J. Kelly A TRAMP W. G. Fay
SCENE.—The last cottage at the head of a long glen in County Wicklow.
(Cottage kitchen; turf fire on the right; a bed near it against the wall with a body lying on it covered with a sheet. A door is at the other end of the room, with a low table near it, and stools, or wooden chairs. There are a couple of glasses on the table, and a bottle of whisky, as if for a wake, with two cups, a teapot, and a home-made cake. There is another small door near the bed. Nora Burke is moving about the room, settling a few things, and lighting candles on the table, looking now and then at the bed with an uneasy look. Some one knocks softly at the door. She takes up a stocking with money from the table and puts it in her pocket. Then she opens the door.)
NORA. Good evening, kindly stranger, it’s a wild night, God help you, to be out in the rain falling.
TRAMP. It is, surely, and I walking to Brittas from the Aughrim fair.
TRAMP. On my two feet, lady of the house, and when I saw the light below I thought maybe if you’d a sup of new milk and a quiet decent corner where a man could sleep (he looks in past her and sees the dead man.) The Lord have mercy on us all!
NORA. It doesn’t matter anyway, stranger, come in out of the rain.
TRAMP. (Coming in slowly and going towards the bed.) Is it departed he is?
NORA. It is, stranger. He’s after dying on me, God forgive him, and there I am now with a hundred sheep beyond on the hills, and no turf drawn for the winter.

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In the Shadow of the Glen

From the opening

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