A'JEAN Tamson's Bairns

By Joe Corrie

Price:

£1.00

Item attributes

ISBN:

978-0-85174-848-1

Acts:

1

Females:

8

Males:

0

Item details

Scottish Play: No. 170

From Wikipedia, Joe Corrie (13 May 1894 – 13 November 1968) was a Scottish miner, poet and playwright best known for his radical, working-class plays.

He was born in Slamannan, Stirlingshire in 1894. His family moved to Cardenden in the Fife coalfield when Corrie was still an infant and he started work at the pits in 1908. He died in Edinburgh in 1968.

Shortly after the First World War, Corrie started writing. His articles, sketches, short stories and poems were published in prominent socialist newspapers and journals, including Forward and The Miner.

Corrie's volumes of poetry include The Image O' God and Other Poems (1927), Rebel Poems (1932) and Scottish Pride and Other Poems (1955). T. S. Eliot wrote "Not since Burns has the voice of Scotland spoken with such authentic lyric note".  He turned to writing plays during the General Strike in 1926.

More information can be found on his Wikipedia page; Joe Corrie.

 

Glenchalloch mansion house, once the home of Sir Michael and Lady Curtis, fell upon evil days and stood empty for many years until taken over and converted into an Eventide Home.

In the village it is believed that Lady Curtis had made pilgrimages to the empty mansion from time to time. The elderly, homeless women who now occupy the house are at variance over an old woman, Mrs. Smith, who has been brought to the Home from a common lodging-house. She is a harmless, dreamy, and mysterious old soul, and her only supporter is Maggie McPhail, a kindly, broad-minded character. Old Mrs. Smith is frowned upon, and even suspected of being a thief, until Lady Mowbrey, the wife of the Health Minister pays a visit to Glenchalloch, and the real identity of Mrs. Smith is disclosed.

There is plenty of scope for acting and production, combining humour with pathos, and with a universal appeal.