46 pages • 1 hour read
Martin McDonaghThe Lieutenant of Inishmore
Fiction | Play | Adult | Published in 2001A modern alternative to SparkNotes and CliffsNotes, SuperSummary offers high-quality Study Guides with detailed chapter summaries and analysis of major themes, characters, and more.
Scenes 1-5Scene Summaries & Analyses
Scene 1 Summary
The play opens in Donny’s cottage on Inishmore, an island off the west coast of Ireland, in 1993. Donny, a middle-aged man, and Davey, his 17-year-old, long-haired neighbor, are staring at a dead cat. Davey asks if Donny thinks the cat is dead. In response, Donny picks up the black cat, and its brains fall from its head. Davey insists that the vet might be able to fix him, and Donny kicks him in the rear. Donny berates Davey for riding his bike recklessly and hitting the cat, Wee Thomas. Davey denies it, exclaiming that he stopped his bike when he saw Wee Thomas lying in the street, picked him up, and brought him to Donny. Davey fetches his bike to prove that there are no bits of cat on the wheels, lamenting that Wee Thomas was a friendly cat, unlike most other cats, including his sister Mairead’s cat. Davey is horrified to learn that the cat belonged to Mad Padraic, Donny’s son, who is in the INLA (Irish National Liberation Army), having been rejected from the IRA (Irish Republican Army) for being too erratic.
Padraic has had Wee Thomas since the age of five, and he has been “his only friend for fifteen years” (6). Padraic left his cat with his father when he joined the INLA. Terrified, Davey begs Donny not to mention his name to Padraic, cursing himself for stopping to check on the cat instead of moving on. Donny cajoles Davey into admitting that he hit Wee Thomas, even if it isn’t true; Davey gives in as long as Donny will protect his name. Donny decides that he’ll call Padraic and let him know that Wee Thomas doesn’t seem to be feeling well and isn’t eating. Davey agrees that giving the bad news “in stages” is the best way to keep Padraic from “roaring home to a dead cat” (9). Davey leaves and Donny dials, calling Davey a “cat brainer” as he goes.
Scene 2 Summary
In an abandoned Northern Ireland warehouse, Padraic tortures James, who is hanging upside-down from the ceiling and crying. Padraic mocks James for sobbing when he’s only removed two toenails, saying he even had the courtesy to remove them from the same foot so James will be able to hobble to a hospital later, which he recommends since he never bothers to disinfect the razor. Next, Padraic tells James to choose which nipple to cut off, threatening to remove both if he won’t choose. James begs that he doesn’t deserve the punishment, but Padraic accuses him of dealing drugs to kids. James pleads that he only sells marijuana to college students, but Padraic blames him for “keeping our youngsters in a drugged-up and idle haze, when it’s out on the streets pegging bottles at coppers they should be” (12).
Before he can start slicing, Padraic’s phone rings. He chats merrily with his dad about what he’s doing, complains that the INLA’s bomb maker is incompetent, and says he’s considering starting a new splinter group. Before ending the call, Padraic learns that Wee Thomas isn’t feeling well and gets upset, weeping and swearing that he’ll be on the first boat home in the morning. After hanging up, James offers compassion for Padraic’s sick cat, suggesting that he might just need pills for ringworm. James claims to have a cat named Dominic, and Padraic is surprised to learn this. Padraic decides to let James keep his nipple and offers him bus fare to the hospital before rushing out. James wishes Wee Thomas well and then under his breath hopes that “he’s dead already and buried in shite” (16).
Scene 3 Summary
Davey is filling his bike tires when he is surprised by a barrage of shots from an air rifle. One strikes his cheek, and he screams out to his sister, Mairead, to stop. Mairead, 16 and attractive with cropped hair and army pants, enters and starts kicking Davey’s bike and threatening to shoot his eyes out for running over a cat that morning. Davey insists that he didn’t, calling Donny a liar, exclaiming, “I’ have as much concern for the cats of this world as you do, only I don’t go around saying it, because if I went around saying it they’d call me an outright gayboy, and they do enough of that with me hairstyle” (18). Davey calls Mairead “mad,” exclaiming that he could find 10 half-blinded cows to prove it. Mairead gets angry at the mention of the cows and defends her shooting them as a protest of the meat market that she has since rethought. Davey repeats that he didn’t hurt any cats, and Donny has him searching for another black cat to take Wee Thomas’s place. Mairead retorts that this will never work because cats have their own unique personalities, like her cat, Sir Roger. Davey agrees, calling Sir Roger stuck up. Davey goes back to his bike, and Mairead starts singing “The Dying Rebel,” an Irish rebel song.
Christy, a Northern Irish man with an eyepatch, enters and stops to compliment Mairead’s gun. Looking at Davey, Christy notes that he recognizes him by his “girly hair” as the boy he saw running over a cat that morning. Davey protests that he only rode up to the cat to pick him up and bring him home, at which point he saw what shape he was in. Christy muses that the cat’s owner must be angry, and Davey agrees that he will certainly be upset when he arrives home at 12 o’clock tomorrow. As Christy exits, Davey calls him back and asks him to tell Mairead that he was mistaken about seeing Davey kill the cat. Christy says that he was raised by Jesuits and taught that lying was wrong, and although it’s possible to make mistakes, particularly with one eye, “as sure as shite I’d swear you aimed for that cat’s head full-pelt, then near enough reversed on the fecker” (22). Christy leaves. Davey swears again that it isn’t true and then runs off, Mairead shooting after him and cursing him.
Scene 4 Summary
Back in Donny’s house, it’s nighttime. Donny and Davey are drinking while they try to cover an orange cat with shoe polish and argue about whether Padraic will be fooled. Davey insists that he wandered for miles after his sister destroyed his bike, unable to find a black cat that was alone because he wasn’t going to steal a cat from children who were playing with it. Donny insults him for having “no guts,” suggesting he should have found the kids’ mother and told her he was taking the cat, beating her and the kids if she refused. They argue about “trampling mams” (24), and Donny claims that he trampled his own once.
Donny asks where Davey got this cat, and Davey is vague, but Donny notices the tag that says, “Sir Roger.” Davey advises that they simply tell Padraic that Wee Thomas has an illness that is making him turn orange and smell like shoe polish. Donny admits that he didn’t quite “trample” his mam, but he kicked her once. Donny finishes covering the cat with polish and asks Davey whether he thinks they’ll manage to fool Padraic. Davey looks at the cat for a moment and says, “He’ll put a gun to our heads and blow out what little brains we have” (26). Laughing, Donny agrees.
Scene 5 Summary
Christy and two other Northern Irishmen, Brendan and Joey, are sitting at their roadside camp. Christy and Brendan are eating beans, but Joey is moping, upset that they killed a harmless cat. Christy says that the ends justify the means, but Joey insists that he didn’t agree to kill cats when he joined the INLA. Brendan and Christy remind him that they did all the killing, but Joey doesn’t even want to be associated with it. He compares killing harmless cats to Bloody Sunday. Christy suggests that Joey form his own splinter group, which Brendan names “The Irish National Being Nice to Cats Army” (29). Joey sulks that they’d just kill him if he did, and they’d probably kill his pets first. Christy reassures Joey that none of them enjoyed killing Wee Thomas, but they needed to lure Padraic home because he is forming splinter groups and attacking innocent drug dealers.
Joey jabs again about cat killers, and they all point their guns at each other. Joey apologizes, admitting that he has a soft spot for cats. Christy reminds him, “You want to get your priorities right, boy. Is it happy cats or is it an Ireland free we’re after?” (30) Joey comments that he’d like both, but then corrects himself when Christy cocks his gun. Christy points out that Oliver Cromwell killed plenty of cats. They plan to wait until Padraic gets home at noon and “enter blasting.” Christy laughs at how he made Mairead think that Davey killed the cat. The three men exit, and Mairead enters, having heard their entire conversation. Cocking her rifle, she follows them.
Scenes 1-5 Analysis
The play opens with shocking gore as Donny and Davey stare at a mangled, dead cat and pick him up with chunks of his brain falling out. From the start, the playwright toys with the notion of violence as materiality. This begins with the cat initiating the ongoing critique of Padraic’s staunch prioritization of a pet’s life over human lives. This also plays with commonly-expressed squeamishness about watching representations of violence against animals, as opposed to the normalized depictions in media of violence against humans. This moment of graphic gore, paired with McDonagh’s quick-paced humorous dialogue, sets up the conventions that in this play, nothing is sacred, the humor will be dark, and the audience will be laughing at things that are not usually supposed to be funny. The play’s absurdist tendencies arise in illogical situations, which McDonagh pushes to extremes, establishing the theme of The Absurdity of Terrorist Violence against innocent people. Donny and Davey have done nothing wrong, yet they are terrified by the punishment that they know Padraic will impose on them anyway. Donny is keeping his son’s cat, suggesting that there is no bad blood between them, yet he knows that his own son will murder him for the death of a cat who, at age 15, has already reached his twilight years.
As Mairead mentions to Davey, Padraic is a second lieutenant in the INLA, making him appear to be the lieutenant named in the play’s title. This suggests that Padraic is the central character and protagonist, but he is almost entirely absent in the first half of the play. His main objective is to save his cat. After the exposition in the first scene, the inciting incident occurs when Padraic learns that Wee Thomas is supposedly sick. Padraic’s action in pursuit of his objective instigates the action of the play and drives it forward, as all the other characters scramble and plot to prepare for his impending arrival. The cheerful brutality with which Padraic tortures James, a low-level drug dealer, demonstrates the high stakes for the other characters in mitigating Padraic’s reactions. Those stakes become even higher when Padraic shows that he cares far more about his cat than he does about torturing a man whose illicit livelihood, as Padraic purports, is damaging to the cause of the INLA. He even pardons James from further torture because James elicits sympathy (from the man who was about to slice off his nipple) by pretending to own a cat. This scene, in which Padraic outlines the types of violence and crimes that are permissible, illustrates the play’s themes of Constructions of Irishness and Illogical Morality, as well as Irish Nationalism and Compulsory Masculinity. Padraic claims to be concerned with the morality of the Irish youth when it comes to punishing drug dealers, but he argues that drugs prevent them from being “out on the streets pegging bottles at coppers” (12). With this, Padraic is not interested in classic morality so much as indoctrination—grooming the next generation of Irish men to prove their masculinity and Irishness by taking up the cause of militant nationalism.
Most of the play takes place in Inishmore, an island with a tiny population in western Ireland, and the idea of escaping to join a paramilitary organization and fight English colonizers in Northern Ireland is a way for men to seek a larger purpose in life. The characters who are fervently entrenched in uncritically supporting these organizations equate them with patriotism, frequently invoking the phrase “a free Ireland” to justify their actions. Mairead, whose impressive shooting talents are wasted in Inishmore, dreams about joining the rebels. She shapes her physical presentation to mimic the aggressive masculinity she sees in men like Padraic, wearing her hair unconventionally short and even attacking her brother Davey with an air rifle as a game. Notably, Davey, who shows no interest in joining the INLA, receives flak for wearing his hair long, which is also considered to be unconventional for a boy within the narrow social expectations of their small, rural town. Davey and Donny are the citizens whom the INLA members are supposedly fighting to free from tyranny, but they instead use their violent tendencies to exert control and to grab power from each other. Despite living during The Troubles, the characters fear Padraic more than any British soldier or Northern Irish loyalist.
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By Martin McDonagh
