The Field - Plot

Plot

The Field is set in a small country village in southwest Ireland.

Rugged individualist Bull McCabe has spent many hard years of labour cultivating a small plot of rented land, nurturing it from barren rock into a fertile field. He has always considered the land his own, and dreams of buying it; now it is being put up for auction. The McCabes intimidate most of the townspeople out of bidding in the auction, to the chagrin of auctioneer Mick Flanagan, but Galwayman William Dee arrives from England, where he has lived for many years, with his own plan for the field. An encounter between Dee and the McCabes ends in death and a cover-up.

John based the story on the 1959 murder of Moss Moore, a bachelor farmer living in Reamore, County Kerry. Dan Foley, a neighbour with whom Moore had a long-running dispute, was suspected of the murder, but the charges were denied by Foley's family.