The Silence of Barbara Synge

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The Silence of Barbara Synge is a unique work of cultural enquiry, combining archival research, literary criticism, and religious and medical history to pull the strands together and relate them to the family's literary descendent J.M. Synge. Taking the alleged death of Mrs. John Hatch (nxE9;e Synge) in 1767 as a focal point, this book explores the varied strands of the Synge family tree in 18th and 19th century Ireland. Key events in the family's history are carefully documented, including a suicide in 1769 which is echoed in an early Synge play, the effects of the famine which influenced "The Playboy of the Western World" in 1907, and the behavior of Francis Synge at the time of the union.

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W.J. McCormack is Professor of Literary History History, Goldsmiths College University of London.