The Mad Islands is a radio play from 1962. It is a fantasy derived from tropes of Irish mythoogy, with echoes of St Brendan and Hy-Brazil (spiced with a healthy borrowing from Hamlet). Muldoon is off on a quest to find and kill the man, the Lord of Eskers, who killed his father. His crew is a motley group led by the professional seafarer Ursach but including a jester and Muldoon's foster-brother. They are soon joined and assisted by a being half-woman, half-seal and absolutely perfect for radio, called Skerrie. Skerrie acts as their guide around the various islands, all of which are inhabited or ruled by people who are mad one way or another. The hermit on his rock is religiously mad. Sisters Branwen and Olwen are mad about their cats and even madder about the possibility of men. The Miller of Hell is omnipresent. It's all light and fantastical until the twist at the end, which is eminently satisfying. Not up there with MacNeice's finest - The Dark Tower and Person From Porlock - but close enough.
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