Tá cumha i ndiaidh an bhaile ag titim isteach orm inniu. It’s an interesting dilemma with respect to homesickness when you’re living on the wrong side of the planet. In the past, I could always live away with the knowledge that I could jump on a plane and be back in Cork within 2-3 days.… Read more »
THE IRISH TARDIS Spotted in the Wicklow hills about three years ago. Naturally, it didn’t work. Bloody Eirecom! (%!!$#!)!
Given the roaring success of ‘Normal People’, we’ve jumped on the sexy Irish band-wagon with the attached cover shot for our new range of exciting romantic and erotic novels under the brand “Love on The Aran Islands”. Titles include: First Touch at Killronan (Cill Rónáin) Fast Times at the Dark Fort Fierce Goings On at Dún… Read more »
Given recent events following the murder of George Floyd, it’s probably worth recalling a story from 2017 when an American cop hilariously tried to counter the popularity of the ‘Black Lives Matter’ movement through the use of his own (cough) Irish heritage. The cop in question was attempting to translate the words ‘Blue Lives Matter’… Read more »
APRIL NEWSLETTER CANCELLED Due to barbaric workloads I’ve had to cancel April’s newsletter. I’m sure the internet can just cope perfectly well by itself while I recover but if anyone finds my temporal lobe, could you please return it to Irish Imbas at the usual address. I’ll respond to all emails, etc. when I get… Read more »
The original stories from the Fenian Narratives (the stories of Fionn mac Cumhaill and the warrior band mistakenly called Na Fianna by medieval and later writers) are believed to have first originated in Leinster. That’s why so many of the Fionn mac Cumhaill stories take place in that region. Over the subsequent centuries however, as… Read more »
A very dense and philosophical article in the Irish Times today considers the revitalization of the Irish language from a number of different angles. Unfortunately, although the article raises some valid and interesting points, it sadly becomes bogged down in its own internal arguments. Trying to pull the intellectual wheat from the chaff is something… Read more »
If you get a chance over the Christmas period, you might want to wallow in your “Irishnessness” with the animated satire of Flann O’Brien’s 1941 novel ‘An Béal Bocht’ (The Poor Mouth) which premiered last year at the Galway Film Fleadh. Flann O’Brien’s original tale was actually a fond piss-take of Irish autobiographies like Peig… Read more »
One of the things I love about Ireland is how the thin film of that present we inhabit is so often perforated by the reality of previous millennia. Many people believe that time travels in a linear fashion from past to present to future but of course that conceptual model doesn’t work in reality. The… Read more »
It’s Te Wiki O Te Reo (Maori Language Week) here in New Zealand, a week when the general population are encouraged to speak Te Reo (meaning, literally, “the language”), attend classes or special events in Te Reo. As someone who works in the conservation and revival of Irish culture, I watch Te Wiki O Te… Read more »
Anyone who’s anyway capable with Irish (the language), or familiar with my work, is probably aware that ‘Liath’ is the Irish word for ‘Grey’ (although it can also mean a grey-haired person). ). Like most Irish adjectives, the word is pretty flexible: Sioc liath is a ‘hoar frost’ for example. Bainne liath is a kind… Read more »
In local Beara folklore, most people are pretty much aware of how Oileán Baoi (Dursey Island) was used by the Vikings as a staging depot to export Irish slaves (mostly female) to overseas markets. A recent study from Iceland however gives some idea of where some of those women might have ended up. Building on… Read more »
