A “Brutal” Deirdre

Abstract Molly Allgood helped Synge with Deirdre of the Sorrows, discussing drafts with him, performing scenes he was struggling to write, even as he neared death in his hospital room, and helping to access the draft from Synge’s family after his death. She then completed the draft with Yeats and Lady Gregory as she knew best what Synge wanted from the play, and performed in the premier. This chapter argues for the collaborative nature of this play and the importance of the dying and dead female body onstage, an embodiment that became more important to Synge as he neared death and as he grew closer to Molly. The chapter closes with a look at Molly Allgood’s death in poverty from a fire as part of the argument that who gets credit for writing plays has real-world consequences for the bodies of the women who performed. In other words, Molly Allgood suffered physically from that erasure