Use of Fantasy in The Playboy of the Western World: A Critical Textual Analysis

Abstract

J. M. Synge’s drama,The Playboy of the Western Worldhas been set in a small village of Ireland called Mayo. No special incidents occur among the people in there. They live a simple life but their simple lives run as per their dreams. That means they live in a dreamy world. All the characters in the play prefer the lives with fantasy to the lives with outer realities. They do not want the everyday realities because these realities for them are full of frustration and anxiety. All the characters in the drama are poor peasants and they are not well facilitated to livea happy life. Therefore, they have to live in a world full of anxieties. In order to forget the fearful and lonely nights, Pegeen Mike, the heroine of the drama, lives in the romantic world. She wishes to wed Shawn and he also wants to wed her. Similarly, Christopher Mahon, the hero of the play, flees away from his village after a patricide in the mercy of the people in the pub of Pegeen’s father. Christy soon forgets the tension of killing his father immediately after he enters in the fantasy world ofwealth as well as the world of romance. He lives in romantic fantasy when he gets chance to talk with the beautiful heroine of the drama about love, marriage and sexuality. He does not think of his dead father rather thinks only of his love with Pegeen. From that he gets full relaxatation. Thus, fantasy is the source of pleasure in sad events of life.