Life
Author of Rebellion Defeated, or the Fall of Desmond (printed for
the author 1745), dedicated to ‘Free-born Englishmen, Friends of
Liberty, and especially those gentlemen in Associations established for
the Defence of their Country [...] in opposition to the destructive schemes
of France.’ Cutts’s connection with Ireland unknown. Concerns
the events following the Desmond rebellion of 1579, when Desmond’s
cousin, Sir James Fitzmaurice, returned with a small force in 1579, to
be followed by Desmond in the following year. Ormonde relentless pursues
Desmond, who is finally killed by a party of soldiers in a cabin on a
moutainside near Tralee. Chars. incl. Lord Grey, Fitzgyrald (Earl of Desmond);
Allan and Blake (Jesuits); imag. chars. incl Castus, a gentleman, Aemula,
wife ofMackveer, and Ablabiia, wife of Cavenaugh; Cavenaugh’s father,
Mackfrenky, takes Desmond’s side against his son et al.; other chars.
incl. two gentlemen, some peasants, and a blind bard. The whole in blank
verse and highly declamatory, with no attempt at character-drawing [...] teems with rhetorical questions. (See G. C. Duggan, The Stage Irishman,
1937.)
[ top ]