John Millington Synge Quotes

• There is no language like the Irish for soothing and quieting.

  John Millington Synge

  Ireland And The Irish, Language, Soothing

  John Millington Synge (2008). “The Complete Works of J. M. Synge”, p.396, Wordsworth Editions

  61 Copy quote

• Every article on these islands has an almost personal character, which gives this simple life, where all art is unknown, something of the artistic beauty of medieval life.

  John Millington Synge

  Beauty, Art, Character

  John Millington Synge (2008). “The Complete Works of J. M. Synge”, p.317, Wordsworth Editions

  17 Copy quote

• A man who is not afraid of the sea will soon be drowned, for he will be going out on a day when he shouldn't.

  John Millington Synge

  Men, Sea, Going Out

  Maurice Good, John Millington Synge (1973). “John Synge comes next”

  9 Copy quote

• Words, particularly in a play, should have the texture of a crisp, autumn apple.

  John Millington Synge

  Autumn, Should Have, Play

  Source: bigthink.com

  7 Copy quote

• I knew the stars, the flowers, and the birds, The gray and wintry sides of many glens, And did but half remember human words, In converse with the mountains, moors, and fens.

  John Millington Synge

  Stars, Flower, Bird

  John Millington Synge (2014). “Synge: Complete Plays: In the Shadow of the Glen; Riders to the Sea; The Tinker's Wedding; The Well of the Saints; The Playboy of the Western World; Deirdre of the Sorrows”, p.31, Bloomsbury Publishing

  26 Copy quote

• The general knowledge of time on the island depends, curiously enough, on the direction of the wind.

  John Millington Synge

  Islands, Wind, Enough

  John Millington Synge (1999). “The Aran Islands”, p.26, Northwestern University Press

  24 Copy quote

• A week of sweeping fogs has passed over and given me a strange sense of exile and desolation. I walk round the island nearly every day, yet I can see nothing anywhere but a mass of wet rock, a strip of surf, and then a tumult of waves.

  John Millington Synge

  Journey, Hiking, Islands

  John Millington Synge (2008). “The Aran Islands and Connemara”, p.39, Mercier Press Ltd

  11 Copy quote

• A translation is no translation unless it will give you the music of a poem along with the words of it.

  John Millington Synge

  Giving, Translations

  The Aran Islands pt. 3 (1907)

  5 Copy quote

• No man at all can be living forever and we must be satisfied.

  John Millington Synge

  Death, Men, Forever

  1904 Riders to the Sea.

  7 Copy quote

• In this cry of pain the inner consciousness of the people seems to lay itself bare for an instant, and to reveal the mood of beings who feel their isolation in the face of a universe that wars on them with winds and seas.

  John Millington Synge

  Pain, War, Wind

  John Millington Synge (2014). “Synge: Complete Plays: In the Shadow of the Glen; Riders to the Sea; The Tinker's Wedding; The Well of the Saints; The Playboy of the Western World; Deirdre of the Sorrows”, p.36, Bloomsbury Publishing

  4 Copy quote

• Before verse can be human again it must learn to be brutal.

  John Millington Synge

  Poetry, Brutal, Humans

  John Millington Synge, Ann Saddlemyer (1998). “Playboy of the Western World and Other Plays”, p.10, Oxford University Press, USA

  4 Copy quote

• When I was writing The Shadow of the Glen I got more aid than any learning could have given me from a chink in the floor of the old Wicklow house where I was staying, that let me hear what was being said by the servent girls in the kitchen.

  John Millington Synge

  Girl, Writing, House

  John Millington Synge, Ann Saddlemyer (1998). “Playboy of the Western World and Other Plays”, p.96, Oxford University Press, USA

  11 Copy quote

• In the middle classes the gifted son of a family is always the poorest -- usually a writer or artist with no sense for speculation -- and in a family of peasants, where the average comfort is just over penury, the gifted son sinks also, and is soon a tramp on the roadside.

  John Millington Synge

  Family, Son, Artist

  John Millington Synge (2008). “The Complete Works of J. M. Synge”, p.235, Wordsworth Editions

  10 Copy quote

• Foreign languages are another favourite topic, and as these men are bilingual they have a fair notion of what it means to speak and think in many different idioms.

  John Millington Synge

  Mean, Men, Thinking

  John Millington Synge (1999). “The Aran Islands”, p.18, Northwestern University Press

  7 Copy quote

• It is the timber of poetry that wears most surely, and there is no timber that has not strong roots among the clay and worms.

  John Millington Synge

  Strong, Roots, Clay

  John Millington Synge (2008). “The Complete Works of J. M. Synge”, p.433, Wordsworth Editions

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• As a man has no right to kill one of his children if it is diseased or insane, so a man who has made the gradual and conscious expression of his personality in literature the aim of his life, has no right to suppress himself any carefully considered work which seemed good enough when it was written. Suppression, if it is deserved, will come rapidly enough from the same causes that suppress the unworthy members of a man's family.

  John Millington Synge

  Children, Writing, Men

  Draft of a preface in "Notebook 16". "The Collected Works of J.M. Synge", Volume 1. Introduction, 1962.

  4 Copy quote

• What is the price of a thousand horses against a son where there is one son only?

  John Millington Synge

  Horse, Son, Thousand

  John Millington Synge (2014). “Synge: Complete Plays: In the Shadow of the Glen; Riders to the Sea; The Tinker's Wedding; The Well of the Saints; The Playboy of the Western World; Deirdre of the Sorrows”, p.98, Bloomsbury Publishing

  7 Copy quote

• Drink a health to the wonders of the western world, the pirates, preachers, poteen-makers, with the jobbing jockies; parching peelers, and the juries fill their stomachs selling judgments of the English law.

  John Millington Synge

  Law, Pirate, World

  1907 The Playboy of the Western World, act 2.

  7 Copy quote

• A low line of shore was visible at first on the right between the movement of the waves and fog, but when we came further it was lost sight of, and nothing could be seen but the mist curling in the rigging, and a small circle of foam.

  John Millington Synge

  Circles, Sight, Fog

  John Millington Synge (2008). “The Complete Works of J. M. Synge”, p.309, Wordsworth Editions

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• It gave me a moment of exquisite satisfaction to find myself moving away from civilisation in this rude canvas canoe of a model that has served primitive races since men first went to sea.

  John Millington Synge

  Moving, Men, Race

  John Millington Synge (1999). “The Aran Islands”, p.14, Northwestern University Press

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• In a good play every speech should be as fully flavored as a nut or apple.

  John Millington Synge

  Nuts, Play, Apples

  7 Copy quote

• At first I threw my weight upon my heels, as one does naturally in a boot, and was a good deal bruised, but after a few hours I learned the natural walk of man, and could follow my guide in any portion of the island.

  John Millington Synge

  Journey, Men, Islands

  John Millington Synge (1999). “The Aran Islands”, p.25, Northwestern University Press

  8 Copy quote

• The drama, like the symphony, does not teach or prove anything.

  John Millington Synge

  Drama, Writing, Symphony

  John Millington Synge, Ann Saddlemyer (1998). “Playboy of the Western World and Other Plays”, p.28, Oxford University Press, USA

  5 Copy quote

• They're cheering a young lad, the champion playboy of the Western World.

  John Millington Synge

  Cheer, Champion, World

  John Millington Synge, Ann Saddlemyer (1998). “Playboy of the Western World and Other Plays”, p.132, Oxford University Press, USA

  8 Copy quote

• All the rare and royal names
  Wormy sheepskin yet retains

  John Millington Synge

  Names, Royal

  John Millington Synge (2008). “The Complete Works of J. M. Synge”, p.434, Wordsworth Editions

  4 Copy quote

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