Within the first ten minutes of the Galway based Dragonfly Theater Company's new play Married to the Sea, you will discover that your witnessing the emergence of three major new Irish talents. In fact, their new play is one of the most genuinely lyrical and evocative new plays unveiled by an Irish theatre company in years.

Onstage, playwright and performer Shona McCarthy has the fierce gravitas of a classical Greek herione, her striking face at times a raw boned mask befitting the plays of Garcia Lorca, and the latter influence in particular can be discerned throughout this important new debut.

Astonishingly, it all works. There's no thematic overreaching, no symbolism on stilts. Instead we are treated to a tale clearly anchored in the traditions and customs of the ancient seafaring community of Galway.

McCarthy is a deeply reflective writer and yet she manages to avoid portentiousness. The play is about as sorrowful a work as one could imagine, yet there are many laughs to be had along the way.

When a Galway mother loses her child to the howling sea she is driven mad by grief (grey mirroring the demise of her own mother). Her eight year old daughter Jo (in a remarkable, brauvura performance by Siobhan Donnellan) inherits the longing that marks three generations of women in this play, but in Jo's case she simply yearns for her fisherman fathers return.

The ancient theme of human helplessness in the face of indiffirent death is given cruel expression in the appearance of a mysterious stranger, a woman the locals begin to call the Queen of Sheeba (played by Raks-Sharqui dancer Agnes Carlon). You could drown in her eyes, notes the wife of the man who is soon abandoned by her huband.

Onstage nets and sails unfurl and furl and people are caught in them. This is McCarthy's first full length play and it's the work of a gifted new writer.

Interestingly, for an Irish playwright, McCarthy is as interested in the image as in the spoken word. This enriches her play enormously and we're treated to that rare thing, an Irish drama that understands the importance of looking as well as hearing.

The costume design, particularly the red on black outfits worn throughout, gently underline the plays theme - of life pressing hard against death, of the desperation hidden beneath the surface of things - as does the simple but effective set.

Fiachra O'Dubhghaill plays the cast of doubtful men (and women) that populate this tale. In the role of Jo's doting grandmother he excels at transforming himself with real facility.

Equally he gives depth and dimension to the men who leave and return, almost as indiffirently as the fate that hangs over their home. With the look of an Irish everyman, he brings instant authenticity to each of his characthers.

Although the dance sequences performed by Agnes Carlon add immensly to the play and its theme, they are at times curiously minimalist, and appear almost token, which they most certainly are not. It's the only directorial mistep in the entire work - it suggests a mindset where less is more - where a broader or more expansive tableau seemed called for.

This woman embodies the sea, human desire, unspeakable yerarning. It would not, I feel, have been gauche to let her give full expression to the wildness as well as the essence of them.

McCarthy pursues her theme remorselessly; she spares nothing. There is, of course, a subtle feminist dimension to this play and a decidely mythic undermusic that might at times confuse or even discomfort certain viewers. But McCarthy never belabours her work, she presents us with a strong tale, told clearly, and the results are never obscure or diffuse.

The three founding members of Dragonfly company met while studying for their master's degrees in drama and theater studies at the University of Galway. Last year they received the Best New Company nomination at the Galway Arts Festival. Frankly, they should have won.

Married to the Sea announces them as the most interesting theater company to have emerged in Ireland in decades. Remember the name, you'll be seeing much more of it.

(Married to the Sea is now playing at the Linhart theater, 440 Lafayette Street New York. Call 212 279-4488 for tickets.)