Kathleen ni Houlihan’s Other Island

Abstract

Shaw’s most direct address to the specific problems of Irish society was John Bull’s Other Island (1904), and he retrospectively described its reception as follows:

Writing the play for an Irish audience, I thought it would be good for them to be shewn very clearly that the loudest laugh they could raise at the expense of the absurdest Englishman was not really a laugh on their side; that he would succeed where they would fail; that he could inspire strong affection and loyalty in an Irishman who knew the world and was moved only to dislike, mistrust, impatience and even exasperation by his own countrymen; that his power of taking himself seriously, and his insensibility to anything funny in danger and destruction, was the first condition of economy and concentration of force, sustained purpose, and rational conduct. But the need for this lesson in Ireland is the measure of its demoralizing superfluousness in England. English audiences very naturally swallowed it eagerly and smacked their lips over it, laughing all the more heartily because they felt they were taking a caricature of themselves with the most tolerant and large-minded goodhumour.²

your Kaithleen ni Houlihan has th’bent back of an oul woman as well as th’walk of a queen. We love th’ideal Kaithleen ni Houlihan, not because she is false, but because she is beautiful; we hate th’real Kaithleen ni Houlihan, not because she is true, but because she is ugly.

Red Roses for Me ¹