I’m very happy to announce that I have completed a new full-length, one-act drama entitled “A Flower of the Field”

Briefly, “A Flower of the Field” is a drama set in 1349 Ireland when the Black Death is stalking the land and all signs of hope have been cruelly ripped from the world – all, that is, except in the city of Kilkenny, where, despite the death and destruction, a gentle friar named John Clyn single-handedly takes care of the infected and the dying in his abbey. One night, however, a sinister woman and her traumatized maidservant come calling and violently turn John Clyn’s world upside down,  threatening to destroy the hope and faith he has worked so very hard to build. Haunted by this sinister woman, as well as a mysterious mendicant and a vengeful bishop – and faced with what appears to be pure evil – how can Clyn possibly emerge triumphant… and who and where is the real John Clyn?

In its essence, “A Flower of the Field” is a fast-paced, thoughtful, yet ultimately inspiring story of redemption and faith amid the accusing finger of evil, multilayered with complex characters and an engrossing plot and underpinned by a supernatural overlay.

As with many of my plays, the play has an historical basis – in this case from the “Annals of Ireland” written by John Clyn himself, a Franciscan friar who served as guardian of the Franciscan Abbey of Kilkenny, which is still (mostly) standing to this day – see below.

In his annals, which are otherwise a long series of dates with basic annotations, Clyn occasionally allowed himself a great flourish of writing and wrote very movingly about the Black Death and its path of destruction through Ireland in 1384-1349 – which you can read here.

Taking this story and combining it with some other historical characters of the time period – including the convicted witch Alice Kyteler and the redoubtable Richard Ledrede, Bishop of Ossory – I knitted together a powerful, unique yarn that, I hope, will resonate.