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The Slab Boys Trilogy

set of three plays written by John Byrne

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General referenceInterpretive dossier study · Crown Archives visual atlas
Record originEnglish Wikipedia
Text licenseCC BY-SA 4.0
Source revisionJul 16, 2026
Entity authorityQ7764719 ↗
Source-derived summary

The Slab Boys Trilogy is a set of three plays by the Scottish playwright John Byrne. The trilogy was originally known as Paisley Patterns. The three plays which make up the trilogy are: The Slab Boys, Cuttin' a Rug, and Still Life. The trilogy tells the story of a group of young, urban, working-class Scots during the period 1957–1972. The Slab Boys Trilogy was revived in 2003 by the Traverse Theatre in Edinburgh starring Paul Thomas Hickey and Iain Robertson in the lead roles. This is the first time that the Traverse Theatre have ever done a revival and it was received to great critical success. In April 2008, the Traverse Theatre premièred Nova Scotia, the fourth part of The Slab Boys story which follows the characters of Phil, Spanky and Lucille into the 21st century.

The Slab Boys

In The Slab Boys, all the action takes place in the morning and afternoon of a Friday in 1957. The scene is the Slab Room of Carpet Manufacturers A.F. Stobo & Co. of Paisley, near Glasgow, Scotland.

Editorial summary

Begin with the source’s own compact description: “The Slab Boys Trilogy” is set of three plays written by John Byrne. The dossier treats that line as a proposition to test through Slab, Boys and Trilogy, not as a finished interpretation.

Editorial reviewA practical starting point whose main value is the path it opens into stronger specialist and primary sources. The current lead gives the account dated anchors—1957, 1972, 2003, 2008—that can be checked directly. The selected authority fields contribute no independent date. For this dossier, Slab, Boys and Trilogy is the immediate research focus.
Editorial analysis

Why this record matters

The phrase “set of three plays written by John Byrne” supplies a clear boundary for inquiry. It also exposes the unanswered questions: who defined that boundary, when it became stable and which sources sit outside it.

Evidence profile

Vocabulary and entity names are the principal evidence signals here, because they determine the precision of every later search. The source revision retrieved here is dated Jul 16, 2026. The linked authority identifier is Q7764719. None of the 0 selected statements returned an explicit reference. The first chronological checks are 1957, 1972, 2003 and 2008.

Critical limits

The absence of detail may reflect summary conventions rather than a lack of surviving documentation. The lead is largely declarative, so disagreement and counter-evidence require a deliberate search beyond the opening account. Authority statements aid reconciliation but still require their own references, qualifiers and ranks to be checked.

How to read it

Use the entry as an orientation point, then follow its citations and revision history. Names, dates and institutional relationships should be checked against the original record.

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  • Subject orientation
  • Search vocabulary
  • Locating named sources
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The closest primary source, responsible institution and strongest cited specialist reference.

Three-step research path

  1. Establish the record: confirm the title “The Slab Boys Trilogy”, its source revision and the description used here.
  2. Expand the search: follow The Slab Boys Trilogy primary sources, The Slab Boys Trilogy archive and Slab research across catalogues and specialist indexes.
  3. Test the account: compare the strongest cited source with the responsible institution’s current record and note any disagreement.

Questions for further research

  1. Which source most directly establishes the central claim about “The Slab Boys Trilogy”?
  2. What terminology or title could unlock a more precise catalogue search?
  3. Which cited source is closest to the event, object or claim?
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Source & attribution

This entry incorporates text from “The Slab Boys Trilogy” on English Wikipedia. Contributors are listed in the page history. Text is available under the Creative Commons Attribution-ShareAlike 4.0 License. Selected authority identifiers and statements are retrieved from Wikidata under CC0; their references and qualifiers remain part of the verification path.