There are three generations of prisoners in Mountjoy including boisterous youngsters who can irritate both other inmates and the audience and the weary old lags Neighbour and "methylated martyr" Dunlavin.

The focus moves to the exercise yard and to the workers who are digging the grave for the soon-to-be-executed Quare Fellow.

The play is a grimly realistic portrait of prison life in Ireland in the 1950s, and a reminder of the days in which homosexuality was illegal and the death penalty relatively common (35 people were executed between 1923 and 1954, about one every 10½ months).

The play is based on Behan's own prison experiences, and highlights the perceived barbarity of capital punishment, then in use in Ireland.

It premièred at the Pike Theatre Club, Herbert Lane, Dublin, on 19 November 1954 to critical success.

It had such success that the Abbey's artistic director, Ria Mooney, pushed the next play back to allow The Quare Fellow to run for six weeks.

In 1962 the play was adapted for the screen and directed by Arthur Dreifuss and starred Patrick McGoohan, Sylvia Syms and Walter Macken.

[9] The Monthly Film Bulletin wrote: "In the film the centre has been shifted from the prison and its inmates in general, to a "hero", the new young, warder who begins by seeing everything as either black or white and (discovering that men can be gaoled for stealing firewood, and hanged for killing the seducers of their wives) comes to appreciate the existence of innumerable shades of grey.

Patrick McGoohan gives a lightweight performance as this innocent, and Sylvia Syms is unconvincing as the Quare Fellow's promiscuous wife.

"[12] Filmink magazine argued "Syms’ character wasn’t in the play but became the focus of the film, which caused her to get worse reviews than she deserved (from the few people who saw it).

She’s actually quite good in a less typical performance (lower class, trash bag) – although the film should’ve been closer to the play.

"[13] "The Auld Triangle", a song from the opening of the play, has become an Irish music standard and is known by many who are unaware of its link to The Quare Fellow.