OVERVIEW

• Playwright

  Pádhraig Ó Giollagáin 

• Setting

  Birmingham, Sasana.

• Synopsis

  A play about the loneliness of exile and a nostalgia for the native townland. It is set in Birmingham around a group of Irish emigrants whose lives consist of digging trench after trench on mile after mile of English road. These men rape a young Irish girl in a public park. They discover she is pregnant – and one of them might be the father – but one man, Mac Dara, takes on the responsibility and manages to collect £70 a week from his colleagues to be given until the baby is born. The man among them whom the baby most resembles will be forced to marry her. The girl seeks to have an abortion by a drunken doctor but the doctor is beaten up by the men and the baby is born.

• Play Type

  Plays General
  

  Number Of Acts

  Full-Length

Cast size

• Male

  8

• Female

  3

• Total

  11

Original Production

• Date of First Production

  27 May 1969

• Production Notes

  Faoi choimirce An Damer.

• Producer

  Produced by An Damer

• Original Venue

  The Damer Hall/An Damer
  

• Irish Premiere Notes

  Rinneadh léamh ar an dráma seo ar stáitse na Péacóige sula ndearnadh an stáitsiú seo air.

Source Of Information

Fuarthas an t-eolas seo ón gclár don chéad léiriú, ó Stair Dhrámaíocht na Gaeilge 1900-1970 le P Ó Siadhail agus ó ghearrthóga nuachta.