Cathleen ni Houlihan Book Review PDF

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Cathleen ni Houlihan (1902) is a one-Act play set in 1798 inside the Gillane family cottage near Killala Bay. On the eve of the 1798 Rebellion, and Michael Gillane’s wedding to Delia, Cathleen lures Michael away from his parents, fiancé, and comfortable future, to join the cheering boys hurrying to welcome French troops who have arrived to help reclaim Cathleen’s four beautiful green fields from the strangers in her house. Resembling Dark Rosaleen and Shan Van Vocht, Cathleen is an allegorical representation of colonised Ireland. Ireland hopes to reclaim her four provinces from English sovereignty. 1 Yeats and Gregory recapture the revolutionary milieu over 100 years after French soldiers landed in County Mayo under General Humbert to support Irish rebels in the 1798 Rebellion. This polemic against English occupation uses Irish rhetorical conventions to provoke Irish audiences. Nicholas Grene recognises that Yeats and Gregory draw on: the hackneyed theatrical trope of strangers in the house, the aisling poetry tradition, and the repurposing of feminine figures from Gaelic mythology like the Morrígan and the Goddess Eire, as rhetorical instruments for contemporary use. Cathleen’s statement perfectly captures the stirring of revolutionary emotion: “Sometimes my feet are tired and my hands are quiet, but there is no quiet in my heart.”2 The play promotes a militant, sacrificial nationalism. The wandering old woman who appears at times of war rejected food or money. Instead, she demanded blood-sacrifice, guaranteeing that young men who pursue Irish independence against their private ambitions “shall be remembered forever”.3 Immortality is evidenced by mentioning legendary Irish warriors, specifically Hugh Roe O’Donnell and Donal O’Sullivan Beare, who fought in Tyrone’s Rebellion, and Brian Boru, who died fighting at the Battle of Clontarf, 1014. 4 While selfgovernance is hinted as a perpetual struggle which may be an impossible ideal, Michael’s sacrifice is validated by Cathleen’s transformation into a young girl with the “walk of a Queen”.5 Therefore, the play acts as a rallying call to unite Irish nationalists against English occupation and demands their complete commitment to reinstating Irish sovereignty. While professing unity, the play implicitly criticises the previous generation of Irish nationalists. Peter and Bridget are portrayed as obsessed with material advancement, their “head full of plans” rather than assisting Ireland’s independence. 6 After boasting his negotiation skills, Peter is reluctant to offer Cathleen a mere shilling for fear of breaking the 100-pound dowry he prioritises for buying more land. Meanwhile, Bridget’s problem-solving is materialistic; Cathleen’s trouble cannot be soothed by a shilling and reminding Michael of his worldly responsibilities does not dissuade him from leaving. The depiction of Peter and Bridget as ignorant to Cathleen’s real identity, and Cathleen’s desire to specifically lure young men, suggests a frustration with and departure from the failures of the Home Rule movement, particularly the defeat of Irish Home Rule Bills in 1886 and 1893. Appearing at a low ebb in Irish parliamentary nationalism, the play attempts a revitalised discourse on nationalism after the fall of Charles Stewart Parnell, while reminding the increasing number of peasant proprietors to continue demanding self-government despite the personal prosperity gained from the Local Government Act 1898. 1

William Butler Yeats, The Collected Works in Verse and Prose of William Butler Yeats, Vol. 4: https://www.gutenberg.org/files/49611/49611-h/49611-h.htm#Page_31 [accessed: 21/2/2020], p.48. 2 Ibid, p.42. 3 Ibid, p.53. 4 Ibid, p.46. 5 Ibid, p.54. 6 Ibid, p.40.

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The insecurity of two playwrights from the Protestant Ascendancy pervades the script as English occupation is framed as Ireland’s only trouble, evading intra-Irish issues. The play’s uncontroversial idealism accommodates various nationalist ideologies, like that of Maud Gonne’s Inghinidhe na hÉireann and Arthur Griffith’s Cumann na nGaedheal. Moreover, Ireland’s development beyond revolution is left ambiguous and to the audience’s subjective imagination because the play neatly concludes with Cathleen’s transformation into a politically-neutral, regal girl. Equally sensitive themes of occultism and Christianity are muffled by romantic nationalism. Exploration of Christianity is limited to Cathleen’s Christlike authority, seeking disciples and demanding absolute loyalty. Aisling Carlin explains the concurrent occultism present in this subtle fairylore plot; Michael’s parents insult Cathleen by offering her money and she, suspected by Bridget of being “a woman from beyond the world”, seeks revenge by giving Michael “the touch”.7 Contrastingly, Yeats and Gregory zealously incorporate Gaelic cultural references to promote the revival of Gaelic culture, and accurately represent the Irish peasantry and their country life. Alongside exoticising places like Enniscrone and Ballina, they refer to: ‘hurling’, a traditional Gaelic sport encouraged by the Gaelic League 8; Irish staples, such as milk and oaten cake9; and the Irish tradition of ‘keening’ over the dead.10 Despite being written in English, Jeffares and Knowlands have identified the use of Gaelic syntactic construction in both Peter and Bridget’s speech, such as “and I after making it” and “and you feeding them”, which add greater authenticity to the play.11 Marrying Gaelic revivalism with nationalism, the playwrights utilise Cathleen as a bard. She educates Michael on Irish history by singing nationalist folksongs, like Anthony Raftery’s ‘The Lament for Fair-haired Donough’ which is accompanied by an old Irish air. 12 Aligning with Yeats and Gregory’s purpose in creating the Irish Literary Theatre, the exposure to Gaelic folksongs and stories are a critical turning point in mesmerizing Michael into devoting himself to Ireland. Gaelic revivalism as a catalyst for nationalist revolution is made starker by Peter’s juxtaposing indifference to Cathleen. Peter treats her as a stranger, momentarily remembering her only as the subject of a song from his distant childhood.13

Once a figment of Yeats’ dream, this emphatically Irish play with an Irish plot, playwrights, production, and cast, was well-received for three nights in April 1902 by over 300 people crowded into St. Teresa’s Hall, Dublin. Irish nationalists were roused by the political propaganda delivered by, in part, the radical Inghinidhe na hÉireann. Their notorious leader and Yeats’ muse, Maude Gonne, played Cathleen in the first showing and her speech addressed the audience not the actors. The polemical efficacy of the play which was republished and reproduced multiple times was summarised by Stephen Gwynn in 1936, he questioned whether “such plays should be produced unless one was prepared to go out to shoot or be shot”. Constance Markievicz, a key figure of the Easter Rising 1916, lauded the play as “a sort of gospel”. In light of late twentieth-century violence in Ireland, the play has received criticism from Conor Cruise O’Brien in Ancestral Voices (1995) for its sinister promotion of blood sacrifice, conflating religion and nationalism. Nevertheless, the 7

Ibid, p.51. Ibid, p.33. 9 Ibid, p.46. 10 Ibid, p.49. 11 Ibid, p.35. 12 Ibid, p.44. 13 Ibid, p.49. 8

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provocative nationalism of Cathleen ni Houlihan cements the play as a bookmark in the history of the Irish dramatic movement.

Bibliography Primary Source William Butler Yeats, The Collected Works in Verse and Prose of William Butler Yeats, Vol. 4: https://www.gutenberg.org/files/49611/49611-h/49611-h.htm#Page_31 [accessed 21/2/2020]. Secondary Source Anthony Bradley, Imagining Ireland in the Poems and Plays of W. B. Yeats (New York: Palgrave Macmillan, 2011), pp. 10-19. John Byars, ‘The Brief and Troublesome Reign of Cathleen ni Houlihan (1902-1907)’, South Atlantic Bulletin, 40:2 (1975), pp. 40-46. Aisling Carlin, ‘Yeats’ aesthetics in Cathleen ni Houlihan’, Yeats Annual, 19 (2013), pp. 65-76. Joseph Chadwick, ‘Family Romance as National Allegory in Yeats’ Cathleen ni Houlihan and The Dreaming of the Bones’, Twentieth Century Literature, 32:2 (1986), pp. 155-168. Robert F. Foster, W. B. Yeats: A Life, Volume I: The Apprentice Mage 1865-1914 (Oxford: Oxford University Press, 1997), pp. 260-262. Adrian Frazier, Behind the Scenes: Yeats, Horniman and the Struggle for the Abbey Theatre (California: University of California Press, 1990), pp. 56-58. Nicholas Grene, The Politics of Irish Drama: Plays in Context from Boucicault to Friel (Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 1999), pp. 63-72. Alexander N. Jeffares and Anthony S. Knowland, A Commentary on the Collected Plays of W. B. Yeats (London: The Macmillan Press Ltd, 1975), pp. 27-36. T. Lucas, ‘Irish Food Before The Potato’, Gwerin: A Half-Yearly Journal of Folk Life, 3:2 (1960), pp. 8–11. Colin Meir, The Ballads and Songs of W. B. Yeats: The Anglo-Irish Heritage in Subject and Style (London: The Macmillan Press Ltd, 1974), pp. 72-73. Christopher Morash, A History of Irish Theatre: 1601-2000 (Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 2002), pp. 122-124. Connor Cruise O’Brien, Ancestral Voices (Dublin: Poolbeg, 1994). Lionel Pilkington, ‘“Every Crossing Sweeper Thinks Himself a Moralist”: The Critical Role of Audiences in Irish Theatre History’, Irish University Review, 27:1 (1997), pp. 152-165. 3

Stephanie Pocock, ‘Artistic Liminality: Yeats’ Cathleen ni Houlihan and Purgatory’, New Hibernia Review, 12:3 (2008), pp. 99-117.

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