The Daughters of Roisin

This amazing one-woman show is a powerful piece of storytelling - at times poetic, often angry, Aoibh Johnson's play is based on her own grandmother's experience as a young unmarried girl who was made pregnant.

Irish society in general, and the Catholic Church in particular, treated these girls in a dreadful way - locking them out of sight and forcebly removing their babies without discussion. WIth the set referencing the convent laundries that many girls were sent  to the tale was actually of a girl who was simply locked away in her room for nine months - unable to go out or even go near the window. "If you can't see it, it's not there" we chant when prompted ... 

This is a hard watch, beautifuly written and acted, bringing light to this shameful period and, hopefully, teaching us some understanding of, and sympathy for, the mothers still hunting for their stolen children.