Riders to the Sea Summary The play, set on an island off the coast of Ireland, begins with Nora bringing in a small bundle with her and telling Cathleen that these may be the clothes of their brother Michael. The young priest told her a body of a drowned man was found at Donegal, and the body might be Michael's. The sisters are scared to open the bundle of clothes because they do not want their mother, Maurya, to know: Michael has been missing for a week and the family had already lost five men to the sea. They hide the bundle in the turf loft of the cottage. Maurya is prepared for the funeral for Michael, with whiteboards for his coffin ready at the cottage. She enters the kitchen; she is a woman who is seen lamenting all the time and worrying that her sons will never come back from the sea. Maurya, Nora, and Cathleen discuss the last son, Bartley, who is also planning to go the sea to sell the family horses so they could get some money. Nora and Cathleen are convinced that Bartley should go to the fair at Galway to sell the animals, while Maurya is still hoping that the Priest will not allow him to go in such dangerous tides. Bartley enters the cottage looking for a new piece of rope. Maurya tries to stop him, but he says he wants to make a halter for the horses; clearly Bartley plans to go to the sea. Maurya again tries to dissuade him by showing him the whiteboards for Michael. Paying no heed, Bartley changes his clothes, asks his sisters to take care of the sheep, and leaves without receiving any blessings from his mother. It is a tradition in Ireland that the son receives the blessings of his mother before going anywhere, but Maurya breaks this fashion. Bartley leaves with a red mare and a grey pony tied behind. Cathleen then notices that he has not taken any food and tells Maurya to walk down to the well to give Bartley his food and the blessings. Maurya leaves using a stick that Michael brought, lamenting over how in her family, the old ones never leave anything behind for their heirs, despite that being the general custom. Once Maurya is gone, the girls retrieve the bundle of clothes from the loft to check if they are Michael's. Nora realizes that the stockings are truly Michael's, because she recognizes her own stitching on them. They count the number of stitches and arrive at the conclusion that Michael was dead and buried. The sisters hide the clothes again because they think that Maurya will be returning in a good mood since she got the chance to bless Bartley; however, Maurya comes back more distressed than ever. She tells her daughters that she saw Michael on the grey pony; she could not bless Ba rtley due due to the shock. To calm her down, Nora and Cathleen show Maurya the clothes and tell her that Michael has had a clean burial. Maurya's laments are interrupted when islanders bring the body of Bartley into the cottage and tell the women that the grey pony knocked Bartley into the sea, where he drowned. Maurya gets on her knees near Bartley's body and sprinkles holy water on him. She finally resigns herself to her fate as she claims that sh e will finally finally sleep at night because she no longer has anyone to worry about: all the men of her family have died to the sea. The whiteboards that were supposed to be used for Michael's coffin will now be used to used to bury Bartley. Bartley. Maurya prays that the souls of her husband, her husband's father, and four sons may rest in peace, peace, and the curtains are drawn.
Riders to the Sea 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.
Riders to the Sea Themes The Power of the Sea The power of the sea the central theme of the text. The Sea is right outside the cottage door, volatile, unpredictable, and implacable. It has taken almost all of Maurya's male family members and is poised to take the rest of them as well. It defies rationality and even God; the Holy Water is a pitiful reflection of it. Difference characters relate to the sea in different ways. For Nora and Cathleen, the sea only matters in terms of losing family members; for Maurya, it is the great enemy; for the young priest, it is of little importance; for Bartley, it is dangerous but is a way of life. The potency of the sea in this play is Synge's meditation on the power of nature and of suffering. Catholicism vs. Paganism The play is steeped in traditional Irish Catholicism: there are priests, blessings, Holy Water, etc. However, traditional Catholicism rests, somewhat uneasily, side-by-side with more pagan religious elements. Maurya doesn't heed the priest's empty, naive platitudes so much as she looks to the stars and other natural phenomena for warnings and signs. She knows more about the island than he does; she is skeptical of his outsider status and he is never even seen within the boundaries of the cottage. She heeds the power of the sea much more than she heeds God. It is only at the end of the text when her battle with the sea is over that she can peacefully submerge herself back into the rituals and rites of her Catholic faith. Tradition vs. Modernity Maurya represents tradition; her children and the young priest, on the other hand, represent modernity. Maurya knows everything about the island and its particulars; her religion is more paganistic than Catholic, her views stubbornly held. She does not embrace new ideas of comforting Catholicism or commerce. She only knows her small life, which is clear when she is wary to even leave her cottage. Maurya's children, in contrast, deride her "senseless" behavior and rigid adherence to her beliefs. They look beyond the island to the wider world; the young priest is the connection between these two spaces. The tensions between the two worlds most impact Bartley, who understands the sea is dangerous but feels its pull because he is a man and must secure a livelihood for his family. At the end of the play it is clear modernity will ultimately domi nate, but it is also clear that Maurya's worldview is still important and has much to teach the younger generation. Gender Roles The characters in the text rigidly adhere to the prescribed gender roles of their time and place. Nora is relatively voiceless, while Cathleen is the keeper of the hearth. Maurya is the quintessential Mother, caring only for her family and the
extension of its lineage: she worries, chastises, and mourns; her sons are her main focus. She is not at all comforted by the fact that her daughters remain living; they are essentially useless in terms of what they can bring to the family. As the man of the family at the opening of the play, Bartley's role is clear: to provide for his family. Cathleen articulates that "it is the life of a young man to be going on the sea" . He is the provider and Maurya's fears that he will die are also related to the problems they will face: "It's hard set we'll be surely the day you're drownd'd with the rest. What way will I live and the girls with me, and I an old woman looking for the grave?" Analysis
Riders to the Sea is short, has very little plot, and has next-to no character development; despite these characteristics (or perhaps due to them?), it is a potent and absorbing work that is a hallmark of the Irish Literary Renaissance and one of Synge’s most important contributions to drama written in the English language. The brief work features capacious, resounding themes of humanity vs. nature, traditional religion vs. modernity, the community vs. the individual, and the particular vs. the universal. As part of the Irish Literary Renaissance (see the “Other” section of this study guide), the play recreated the spirit of the Irish language in English through using Gaelic speech patterns. It also celebrates the dignity and stoicism of the people of the Aran Islands: this depiction is intended to ameliorate contemporary criticism of these people as backward and primitive. Indeed, while the poverty in which Maurya and her family live, together with the fact that the island seems extremely far removed from the mainland’s industrialization and modernization, suggests that they are lagging behind, the universality of their sentiments and suffering elevate their archaic existence to one that is much more resonant and impactful. That suffering and sorrow are what lend themselves to the play’s categorization as a tragedy, though it lacks some of the essential hallmarks of that genre. Ruth Fleischmann writes, “Many elements of the play remind one of the classical tragedies of antiquity: the compelling structure, the foreshadowing of the tragedy and its inevitability, the element of guilt which is not personal guilt, the stoic acceptance of fate, the great simplicity and dignity of the main character.” The characters do not possess any flaws (e.g., pride, anger, lust) that bring about tragedy, however: the tragedy lies in the implacable, insurmountable power of the sea and of fate. The sea’s adversary, Maurya, is not a nuanced or well developed character: instead she is the archetypal suffering mother, an exemplar of the Virgin Mary in the Pieta, that iconic Christian image of maternal suffering. She has lost her father-in-law, husband, and four sons to the sea thus far. At the opening of the play she is sure that her son Michael is gone as well, and is fearful that her youngest, Bartley, will be next. She sees herself at constant war with the sea, and with this body count it is no wonder. As critic Denis Donoghue writes, “to Maurya the Sea is the Enemy, the destructive principle, destroyer of human and family
continuity.” She feels its powers deep within her bones and her children’s scoffing and protestations can do nothing to mitigate it. And, of course, Maurya’s awe of the sea proves to be “right," for she does indeed lose her remaining son. The sea has emerged victorious in this cruel game and it is only after it officially does so that Maurya can find peace in the acceptance of her profound losses. While her words of “it’s a great rest I’ll have now, and it’s time surely. It’s a great rest I’ll have now, and great sleeping in the long nights after Samhein” may seem perplexing or even callous, in fact they make a great deal of sense given the cessation of this lifelong struggle. The perplexity at Maurya’s behavior and beliefs is most clearly observed in her children. Nora, Cathleen, and Bartley are openly skeptical, and sometimes quite derisive, of their mother. This is due to the fact that, as critic Judith Remy Leder notes, the play can be read as is more than just a work about noble primitives: “It is an account of a cultural battle…[and we should view] the play as a psychologically accurate representation of turn-of-the-century Irish peasants, rather than as an idyllic, romanticized picture of them.” Maurya is on one side of encroaching modernity and her children on the other. Maurya believes in signs and omens. Her world is small and circumscribed, hence her reluctance to even leave the cottage to go down to Bartley. Leder notes that Maurya even uses “rhetoric characteristic of the oral tradition…her language is not easily dismissed. It is ‘hard’ and ‘dark’ and, as Maurya hints, should have the power to ‘hold.’” She finds meaning in every small thing, as when she is handed Michael’s walking stick and says, “In the big world the old people do be leaving things after them for their sons and children, but in this place it is the young men do be leaving things behind for them that do be old” . She also, of course, has a vision of her dead son Michael and is convinced that Bartley is going to die as well; this certainty is why she avoids giving her son the traditional Irish blessing. By contrast, the children inhabit a more modern world (or at least they are trying to). They do not believe in signs or omens and refuse to orient their life around the mysteries and vagaries of the sea. Nora is content to merely parrot the young priest’s words, and seems interested in the wider world. She does not know much about island traditions and is generally aloof. Cathleen might be slightly more traditional (she is the keeper of the hearth and is more like her mother) but she too questions Maurya’s blessing, supports Bartley’s choice to sell the horses, and is frustrated with the tensions tradition creates with modernity. Bartley is not as outwardly disrespectful of his mother, but he is very much a transitional figure. He firmly belongs to the island, but he does not have his mother’s fear of the sea. The sea is his livelihood, and as a modern man he thinks he can control it. He is obsessed with time and action while the island seems to exist outside of time. As Leder points out, he only has eight lines in the play and four mention the word “going," which demonstrates that he is always looking outward and desiring action. Finally, what makes him a transitional (and tragic) character is that he partly does hold onto tradition (as seen in his utterance of the blessing) while at the same time as he throws his hat into the young priest’s ring.
This young priest is one of the more fascinating elements of the play even though he is never seen onstage. He is a figure constructed from the words of the other characters, and their relative position in regards to tradition vs. morality determines how they feel about him. The children seem to take comfort in the man’s easy and confident opinion that God would never leave Maurya without any sons. He is everything that Maurya is not: young, an outlander, comfortable, confident, and “modern.” He is becoming an authority figure on the island to the extent that the clothes from the drowned man are given to him; Leder calls him a mediator between the island and the mainland. His Catholicism stands in contrast to the pagan spirituality of Maurya and islanders like her, but he is the interloper and is defied at the end of the play when the sea takes Bartley. The young priest is a representative of the orthodox Catholicism that the island denizens adhere to, but this orthodoxy is constantly undermined by the power of the sea. Throughout the play Maurya in particular flirts with paganism, referring to signs and symbols and eschewing the priest’s optimistic statement that God would never allow her to lose all her sons. Critic Denis Donoghue writes, “the thematic situation of the play derives from the inhuman power of the Sea, and Synge has placed before the eyes of his audience a representation of sea-death in the white boards standing by the wall of the cottage.” The reminder of the sea’s potency is thus ever-present, but Catholicism is as well. The focus on nails at the end is a reminder of Jesus’s sacrifice on the cross. Donoghue believes that at the end of the play Maurya moves more into a Christian realm through her acceptance of the events of her life. The emphasis is on the prayer, the Holy Water, the burial, and the afterlife. She truly is the image of the Virgin Mary.
