Dancing at Lughnasa: The Memories of Michael Evans

Dancing at Lughnasa is about the ideological, historical, and cultural issues in the fictional town of Ballybeg, Ireland. Michael Evans speaks of the memories growing up when he was seven years old with his unmarried mother and aunts, (acknowledged as the Mundy sisters in the play) and with no father during the summer of 1936.

Jack, Michaels uncle comes home from Africa with malaria after being away for twenty five years. Jack isn’t the same after and has come home to die.

Michaels father, Gerry arrives during the same summer, announcing he is going to Spain to fight. Life goes on with issues being thrown at the Mundy sisters. The Mundy sisters keep a close knit unit, in order to deal with the dilemma of having Jack and Gerry’s existence. A major obstacle disrupts the close knit unit as a result, the bond they had is beyond repair.

Characters:

Dancing at Lughnasa has eight main characters. Michael Evans as an adult is the narrator recapping his memories as a seven year old.

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Michael as a seven year old is surrounded by love, because the Mundy sisters nurture him. His aunts are acknowledged as the Mundy sisters: Kate, Maggie, Christina, Rose, and Agnes.

Kate is the oldest and is the mother figure for the other sisters. She is the only sister with a steady income working as a schoolteacher. Maggie is the joker of the family and releases tension in the household. Christina is twenty six years old and is the youngest.

She is the mother of Michael. She goes in and out of depression from Gerry walking in and out of their lives. Rose is thirty two years old, however acts the youngest and immature. Rose is vulnerable when she sees Danny Bradley, her crush, and believes that he loves her. The sisters are protective of her from Danny because they know he only wants to abuse her simple nature for his own benefit. Rose is really close to Agnes who is older than her. Agnes has a quiet personality and helps keep the house in order. Agnes has a passion for knitting.

The father of Michael, Gerry Evans left Christina after fathering her illegitimate son. He works as a gramophone salesperson and he previously was a ballroom dancer. Gerry has a family in Wales, a wife and several sons.

Father Jack is in his fifties and is the brother of the Mundy sisters. He worked as a missionary in Africa before coming back to Ballybeg. People respect him for the work he has done. Jack has memory issues, often forgetting the sisters names or confusing them with Okawa who he was close with back in Africa.

Perspective:

In Dancing at Lughnasa, Kate Mundy has the most revealing perspective about cultural context of the period. Kate is the mother figure in the house and is the only wage-earner working as a schoolteacher. She is devoted to Catholic religion. Throughout a majority of the play, Kate shows her dislike in the pagan practice. Kate tries to force the Catholic moral onto her sisters, however they have their own sense of religion. A song that was played earlier had a line that said “killed all Christian conversation in this country”, when kate hears this she doesn’t like it because the song is un-christian. Kate is a judgmental sister, however it’s because she wants the best for her family.

All the sisters want to go to the harvest dance, Lughnasa, however Kate says “Do you want the whole countryside to be laughing at us--woman of our years--mature woman dancing?”. Kate doesn’t want the sisters to be going to the dance and make a fool out the family, since the dance is for younger people. The family is already put to shame with Christina having a child out of wedlock, which puts the family at a disgrace from other people’s eyes. Kate categorizes the family as a group of single sisters who support one another in their own cottage, which shows that the family is not wealthy and are looked down upon. Even though Kate dislikes the pagan practices that includes dance, when there is music and dance for a moment all the sisters are enjoying the moment together. During the harvest, Kate watches the scene with others people dancing with unease, however Kate suddenly starts to dance. She “leaps to her feet, flings her head back, and emits a loud “Yaaaah’. Kate dances alone totally concentrated, totally private”. Music is representative of a non Christian belief, however Kate who is most mature and committed to her religion loses herself in the music. This shows that, not only do the other sisters rebel and dance, but Kate sows that she secretly longs to rebel and have the freedom from the expectations. Kate can’t do this, since she is the mother figure in the family. Once the music stops completely, Kate is the first person to stop, showing us that as much as she wants freedom from society, she knows in reality she has responsibilities and duties to fulfill.

The major cultural context we get from studying Kate Mundy as a character is the powerful Catholicism ideals and how the sense of freedom from society was taken away. Music and dance threatens Kate because she is scared of freedom. The danger that comes with freedom foreshadows death, since at the end Rose and Agnes left and all that awaited for them was death. Even though music and dance might threaten the sisters because of the association of death, it also contributes to their identity. While the music and dance might make the sisters lose control for a moment, they are also able to find themselves through this. I learned that in 1936 in Ireland, for this type of family who is poor and looked down upon, the music and dance helps them get through life and to keep on living. It frees them from reality for a moment and makes them breakaway from the Irish Catholic ideology.