Eliza was obviously interested in people who came from different cultures, and she tried to understand them by studying their languages. We see this in some of her first poems written in Ireland. For instance, she made a point of using Irish placename spellings, rather than anglicised ones, when describing the impressive natural features of south County Down, including the Mourne Mountains. Continue reading
My whistle calls the drops,
till they tumble down in torrents,
pounding on the rocks and on the craggy shore.
Then the flood runs swirling brown through every creek and channel,
as though it cannot wait to fill them to the brim, Continue reading
He first met her by chance as she was emerging from a taxi, ‘…a vision in black velvet and volumised hair’, recognising O’Hagan as ‘that Scottish boy’ and his response in kind, ‘And you’re that country girl.’ Continue reading
he video ‘was created to capture Brian’s deep knowledge of the craft, specifically the specialised stretching and table cutting techniques that modern machines simply cannot replicate…and serves as a visual record of a vanishing skill and an important piece of the cultural fabric of Dublin’. Continue reading
She brought ashore a language / and a pocketful of scraps: / a seagull nested in her mind / and she found shelter in a doorless house / that would let her neither in nor out / though she escaped in a dream / and saw before her a tribe / who reminded her of the dead Continue reading
Much of Irish novel writing has descended into Celtic Noir in rejection of Irish romanticism. ‘Boy from the Sea’ sifts through it all. Continue reading
‘iomán’ focal ar ‘bhreac’ a mhaireann i nGaeilge Chorr na Móna amháin.
A word for ‘fish’ only used in Corr na Móna.
‘sham’ scoláire lae ó Thuaim a chuaigh abhaile gach tráthnóna.
‘sham’ a day-boy from Tuam who went home each evening. Continue reading
Melbourne Hosts successful two-day symposium on Irish Language. Next is a review of Australian novelist and diarist Helen Garner’s How to End a Story, much appreciated by those of us who are Garner fans. ‘Priests in the Family’ provides Enright’s intriguing family connection to James Joyce, followed by an ‘Introduction to Ulysses’ where she talks about her personal experience of starting to read that famous book at the age of fourteen, ‘mainlining language, getting high on words’ Continue reading
Beads of rain streak the window beyond which there is a violet tint in the sky as dusk begins to fall. Dim telegraph poles slip by. Then the chequerboard of yellow and black at the edge of a small town, and bubbled letters caught in the floodlights of an AstroTurf pitch. Continue reading
Always in a hurry, the fishmonger would stay in the middle of the street and shout out that he was there. Women rushed out of their houses with their aprons on. Clutching their purses, they queued for the fish wrapped in newspaper. Continue reading
Tinteán 