Skip to main content
Gifts from The Morning Star
O’Casey and revolution
On the 60th anniversary of the playwright’s death JENNY FARRELL draws attention to the potential for revolution portrayed in his little known late work
LIBERATED ENERGY: (R) Beltane Fire Festival, Calton Hill, Edinburgh, Scotland, 2012; (L) Portrait of Sean O’Casey by Augustus John, 1926 [Stefan Schafe - Lich/CC; Public Domain]

SEAN O’CASEY was the first English-speaking dramatist of international significance to emerge from the proletariat. One of the recurring themes in his work is that of revolution. While in his early Dublin plays he controversially considered the Irish working class not yet ready for revolutionary change, his later works explore the potential for revolution.

O’Casey’s second last play, Figuro in the Night (1961), is about revolution and liberation. The play is set in a new suburb of Dublin, flanked by two monuments — one commemorating the fallen Irish who served in the British army during World War I, the other honouring those who died for Irish liberation. Both monuments document death.

The arrival of a third sculpture, a “Manneken Pis” statue in the city centre (in O’Connell Street), introduces a new note. In O’Casey’s play, it becomes a catalyst for a revolutionary uprising, where the people — especially the youth — overthrow the old order in a joyful, almost carnivalesque manner. The playwright focuses on the human dimension of the revolution, emphasising the liberation and reintegration into the nature of the whole person. 

The 95th Anniversary Appeal
Support the Morning Star
You have reached the free limit.
Subscribe to continue reading.
Similar stories
fanon
Opinion / 24 June 2025
24 June 2025

On the centenary of the birth of the anti-colonial thinker and activist Frantz Fanon, JENNY FARRELL assesses his enduring influence

WILL YE STOP OVER-ACTING? Paul Hilton (Joxer Daly) and Mark
Theatre Review / 10 October 2024
10 October 2024
LYNNE WALSH regrets that unity is denied to a fine cast let down by the baffling spectacle of a poor lead performance
NAZI INFLUENCER: (Above) Caspar David Friedrich’s Wanderer
Opinion / 3 September 2024
3 September 2024
As Caspar David Friedrich’s 250th anniversary is celebrated in Berlin and New York, JENNY FARRELL urges viewers of the German Romantic painter to understand its true historical context, and beware its co-option by the far-right
(L) Caspar David Friedrich, The Sea Of Ice (1823-4); (R) Sel
Opinion / 19 August 2024
19 August 2024
As Caspar David Friedrich’s 250th anniversary is celebrated in Berlin and New York, JENNY FARRELL urges viewers of the German Romantic painter to understand its true historical context, and beware his co-option by the far right