Written in 1864 and set during the Irish rebellion of 1798, Arrah na Pogue is is an entertaining tale of romance and misadventure with rascally rebels, despicable villains and love struck youths. As night falls on the Wicklow mountains, the popular but incorrigible rebel Beamish MacCaul is lying in wait. He's out to ambush the cowardly rent-collector Michael Feeny and relieve him of a 'big lump of money.' That done, he's off to marry Fanny Power. Down in the valley, love is in the air for Shaun the Post and our heroine Arrah Meelish too. But Arrah has a secret. And Michael Feeny's found out. As Shaun and Arrah celebrate their wedding, revenge comes a-calling. Love must conquer all - including the hangman's noose. The play is full of Boucicault's trademark comic roguery, farce and melodrama, which has influenced Irish playwrights including Synge, O'Casey, Shaw and McDonagh. This edition features an introduction by leading Boucicault scholar Dr Scott Boltwood.

Written in 1864 and set during the Irish rebellion of 1798, Arrah na Pogue is is an entertaining tale of romance and misadventure with rascally rebels, despicable villains and love struck youths. As night falls on the Wicklow mountains, the popular but incorrigible rebel Beamish MacCaul is lying in wait. He's out to ambush the cowardly rent-collector Michael Feeny and relieve him of a 'big lump of money.' That done, he's off to marry Fanny Power. Down in the valley, love is in the air for Shaun the Post and our heroine Arrah Meelish too. But Arrah has a secret. And Michael Feeny's found out. As Shaun and Arrah celebrate their wedding, revenge comes a-calling. Love must conquer all - including the hangman's noose. The play is full of Boucicault's trademark comic roguery, farce and melodrama, which has influenced Irish playwrights including Synge, O'Casey, Shaw and McDonagh. This edition features an introduction by leading Boucicault scholar Dr Scott Boltwood.

Deirdre McFeely presents the first book-length critical study of Dion Boucicault, placing his Irish plays in the context of his overall career. The book undertakes a detailed examination of the reception of the plays in the New York-London-Dublin theatre triangle which Boucicault inhabited. Interpreting theatre history as a sociocultural phenomenon that closely approximates social history, McFeely examines the different social and political worlds in which the plays were produced, demonstrating that the complex politics of reception of the plays cannot be separated from the social and political implications of colonialism at that time. The study argues for a shift in focus from the politics of the plays, and their author, to the politics of the auditorium and the press, or the politics of reception. It is within that complex and shifting field of stage, theatre and public media that Boucicault's performance as playwright, actor and publicist is interpreted.

Essays on the touring of Irish theatre, at home and abroad.

Reproduction of the original: The Colleen Bawn by Dion Boucicault