The Tinker's Wedding is a two-act play written by Irish playwright J. M. Synge. The author's only comedy, it is set on a roadside near a chapel in rural Ireland. As the title suggests, the main characters are Irish Tinkers.
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Sarah Casey convinces the reluctant Michael Byrne to marry her by threatening to run off with another man. She accosts a local priest and convinces him to wed them for ten shillings and a tin can. Michael's mother shows up drunk and harasses the priest, then steals the can to trade for drink. The next morning Sarah and Michael go to the chapel to be wed, but when the priest finds that the can is missing he refuses to perform the ceremony. Sarah protests, and a fight breaks out that ends with the priest tied up in a sack. The tinkers free him after he swears not to set the police after them, and he curses them in God's name as they flee in mock terror.
The play had its world première at His Majesty's Theatre, in London, on 11 November 1909.
Synge, J.M.. The Complete Plays. 1st. New York: Vintage Books, 1935.
Mary Burke. 'Tinkers': Synge and the Cultural History of the Irish Traveller. Oxford University Press, 2009 (ISBN13: 9780199566464 / ISBN10: 0199566461)
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