Juno And The Paycock

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Juno and the Paycock: A play based on Realism According to the Oxford Canadian Dictionary the meaning of civil war is “a war between citizens of the same country.” In 1923 in Dublin, Ireland a society existed that obviously fits this definition. The community was separated in two groups: the Free- Staters and the Diehards. Free-Staters were those who had “accepted the treaty negotiated by Collins and the Diehards were those who rejected it” (Lecture 2); this led to the civil war in Ireland. This was the current situation in Ireland at the time to which Sean O’Casey refers to in his play Juno and the Paycock. O’Casey brilliantly uses various literary and dramatic methods in his play to communicate theme within the play. He uses the concept of, off-stage sounds, literary allusions, name imagery, metaphors, lighting, costume and slap-stick comedy. O’Casey chooses to deal with the Irish civil war by writing a Realist play. Furthermore, to comprehend what it means for a play to be a realist play, realism needs to be defined. The definition of realism according to the Oxford Canadian Dictionary means, “an interest in regarding things in their true nature and dealing with them as they are” and further “ in drama realism is a synonym for a well made play, which consists of a linear plot and is chronologically ordered” (Lecture 2). O’Casey further integrates “setting, clothing and dialogue to resemble the real world in 1923” (Lecture 2). Therefore, I intend to in this paper focus mainly on the theme of realism in Juno and the Paycock and to discuss how O’Casey portrays realism within the play. Although O’Casey uses many methods in his play to represent he realism but, in terms of the characters O’Casey chose the names of the characters specifically to represent their personality. Each character has some situation to deal with that brings
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