Az Eszterházy Károly Tanárképző Főiskola Tudományos Közleményei. 1989. 19/3. (Acta Academiae Paedagogicae Agriensis : Nova series ; Tom. 19)

Bertha, Csilla: Distortions of Character in John B. Keane's Peasant Plays

- 43 more overtly cruel, harsh and uncompromising, although tie too

; tries to understand the motives of such actions and benaviour. The most often recurring themes of Irish peasant plays are centred around the land and the house: hunger for land, property, money: marriage - often as the result of matchmaking - as a means of acquiring land and property or connecting land and family; emigration as an escape from misery and its reverse: homecoming, and, in connection with all these, the relationship of the people to the law and the chutch. Keane's early plays give interesting examples of how he explores some of these subjects and how he dramatizes the distortions that these concerns can lead to. Keane's first and very powerful play, Siv

e, shows one possibility of renewing the peasant drama. Its theme, matchmaking, is not particularly Irish. The basic story of die innocent young girl forced to marry an old rich nan was already known from the Italian commedia dell' arte, where it led to a happy ending. In Irish folk songs and ballads - just like in many Hungarian ballads, too the dark and tragic dimensions of the same situation are fully acted out: the only escape possible for the young girl is death. This well-known story in Siv

e receives vivid and unique treatment. On the one hand, the peasant milieu is created with faithful realism: the everyday activities, the miserable conditions, the pathetic relationships among the characters come to life on die stage in numerous well-observed, small details. The greed for land and money, which originates in misery but results in sacrificing human life, is painted with almost as dark colours as in Kodolányi's Földin

dulá

s ('Landslide'). Tragedy looms very heavily in the Hungarian play, and, although at the end it resolves in a ("tope for renewal, frightful examples show to what deformation of character and desolation of life the preference for material riches may lead. Sive ends with tragedy, and in this play some lighter tone is touched in the occasional comedy of character and situation. Thich is in accordance with the greater sanse for irony and tragicomedy in Irish literature in general than in the altogether more tragic main line of Hungarian. Wtiat elevates Sive abnve the level of naturalism and particularity is its ballad-like quality. Some critics claim that Sive's character lacks