O’CASEY, Sean. Songs of the Wren – Humorous and Sentimental – New Series No I.

Dublin, Fergus O’Connor, circa 1918. Octavo. Single printed sheet folded (pp. 8). A very good unopened copy of this scarce early work by a leading Irish dramatist of the 20th Century.
Sean O’Casey (1880-1964), playwright, born in Dublin into a working class family and christened John Casey. His father’s death in 1886 plunged the family into poverty. Self-educated, he was deeply involved in the Labour Movement and took part in the ‘Lock-Out’ strike of 1913. He was secretary of the Irish Citizen Army under James Connolly, but left when it moved closer to a Republican position. Encouraged by Lady Gregory, he began to submit plays to the Abbey Theatre; and after some years success came with the production of ‘The Shadow of a Gunman’ (1923), which marked him as the new great voice of Irish theatre. In 1926 he left for London to become a full time writer. His next play ‘The Silver Tassie’ was rejected by the Abbey. This was a bitter blow to O’Casey and estranged him from the directors.