30 pages • 1 hour read
John Millington SyngeRiders to the Sea
Fiction | Play | Adult | Published in 1904A modern alternative to SparkNotes and CliffsNotes, SuperSummary offers high-quality Study Guides with detailed chapter summaries and analysis of major themes, characters, and more.
Symbols & Motifs
The Sea
As the title implies, a major motif of the play is the sea. The sea is made ever present in the play by the dialogue; the characters constantly reference the sea, how dangerous the sea is, having to cross the sea to sell wares, and what they have lost to the sea. The sea is a symbol of the power of the natural world. It is both a provider and destroyer for the inhabitants of the Aran Islands. The land of the islands is rocky, so the islanders cannot grow enough food for self-sufficiency. Instead, they must travel the rough seas between the islands and mainland Ireland to sell their wares at markets and fairs in Connemara. The weather, however, is often stormy, creating dangerous sailing conditions. As a result, the islanders often lose fathers, husbands, and sons to the sea, as Maurya has many times over.
The sea, however, does not function only as a symbol of life and death; the sea is the driving force of the play. The plot moves forward through the behavior of the sea as it returns the belongings of one son to the island and takes the life of Maurya’s final son. As a motif and symbol, the sea dominates the play and the lives of the characters.
Death and Grief
Death and grief are predominant motifs in Riders to the Sea. The premise of the play is that of the loss of life to the sea; Maurya’s tragic journey revolves around the sea and everything it has taken from her. Death is a familiar presence on the islands, where men must traverse rough waters to sell their wares on the mainland, and the Irish people, particularly those in rural areas, maintained the old traditions for coping with grief.
These traditions associated with loss were not limited, in terms of participation, to the family members of those who passed; communities gathered around those left behind and joined in the grieving process. The major tradition associated with Ireland is that of keening, or prolonged, high-pitched wailing to express sorrow or grief. In Riders to the Sea, several women from the community enter the house specifically to keen and grieve with Maurya and her daughters. In this way, death and grief represent not only loss but community.
Stage Props: Nets, White Boards, and the Color Red
The stage props of Riders to the Sea provide important visual symbols for audiences. The nets, for instance, represent the livelihood of the family—the men have all been fishermen—and they also help create a sense of entrapment for a family that both lives and dies by the sea. The cramped cottage feels like a trap with the nets draped behind and above the family members. By referencing fishing, the nets also bring the sea into the household to, alongside the sea-filled dialogue, create a sense of inescapability in regard to the sea and the family’s fate.
The white boards propped against the wall of the cottage combine land and sea together—they had to come from the land (trees), but since substantial trees do not grow on the island, the boards had to be sent for and brought from Connemara across the sea. Such white boards were used to make coffins, so the boards also symbolize death from the opening of the play. They were bought for Michael, whom they thought (correctly) was dead, but when the family discovers that only his clothes, rather than his body, washed up on shore and that Bartley has joined his brother in the grave, the boards become useful for yet another death.
The color red does not often appear in the play, but each appearance is meaningful. Red is a vibrant color, especially when contrasted against the grays of the rocky landscape and stormy skies. When Bartley prepares the ponies for his trip, the audience is told that one is gray and the other red, symbolizing the close relationship between life and death in the play. When the mourners arrive with Bartley’s body, the female mourners wear red petticoats over their heads and a red cloth is thrown over Bartley; that cloth is saturated with seawater, giving it a grayish cast and recalling the juxtaposition of both the red and gray ponies and of the living and dead brothers that Maurya saw riding them.
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By John Millington Synge
