I’m always slightly cynical of the Samhain reinvention over the past few decades and I think the more we align with the American tradition of ‘Halloween’, the further we get from what we were. That said, there’s no denying the fun of events back home and Limerick have certainly pulled out all the stops for… Read more »
These are some recreation images for the Broch of Gurness – a kind of stone roundhouse from the Iron Age, located in the northeast of Orkney. This was an important community centre at various points over the historical timeline with the initial settlement estimated to have occurred somewhere time between 500 and 200 BC. Sometime… Read more »
Oisín and Niamh galloping towards Tír na nÓg. Or is it? Is this an authentic reproduction of the classic Fenian tale or something else entirely? “How we picture Irish mythology” – the next in-depth post from Vóg (subscriber edition) on 30 April. You can find the ‘free’ and ‘paid’ sign-up to the newsletter HERE
We had a bunch of foreign visitors arrive at our home in Cork last night.Being hospitable, we fed them at the kitchen table.As soon as they’d consumed what we’d offered, they got up and started rummaging through the cupboards, combing through our personal correspondence, pulling our belongings out and throwing them one side as they… Read more »
The 4th book in the Fionn mac Cumhaill Series (Fionn: The Stranger at Mullán Bán) is now a close to final draft (another three to four weeks are required to complete the reviewing and editing process). Irish Imbas Patreon supporters should be contacted by the end of October. The book gets officially released on 14… Read more »
I don’t know how many readers have been following that LOTR spin-off (‘The Rings of Power’) but from an Irish perspective, I can tell you that a lot of people are angry at the creators’ appropriation of Irish accents for their Hobbit/Hapfoot (or whatever they’re called) characters. Misrepresentation of someone else’s culture has a longer-term detrimental impact on… Read more »
This beautiful painting is entitled “Oisin Rides to the Land of Youth”. Painted in 1936 by American artist Newell Convers Wyeth. it represents a more Anglophile view of Irish mythology that many non-Irish creators continue to produce today. You can’t fault Convers Wyeth however. A talented illustrator and painter, he produced a huge body of… Read more »
Over the last few years. I’ve restricted my public work on Irish culture and mythology to the three Celtic Mythology Collections and haven’t really published anything further on the topic. This was predominantly due to a growing cynicism with the ‘spiritual’ industries and ‘new age’ style religions who regularly comandeer elements of Irish culture and… Read more »
I’m taking a whole selfish three days for writing this weekend. I’m hoping to finish one chapter of Liath Luachra: The Metal Men and make a serious dent in another. As usual, I draft out various rough images to get the mood/atmosphere clear in my head. Wish me luck.
I’ve always had a lot of time for Irish film stalwart, Gabriel Byrne, but his latest movie ‘Death of a Ladies Man’ really seems to be his most interesting to date. An Irish-Canadian co- production, the movie concerns an Irish actor struggles with a crisis of conscience once he finds out that he doesn’t have… Read more »
I currently have a new series in development based around the adventures of an Irish sportswoman living in the west of Ireland. Set just a few years in the future, I’ll probably be using a lot of Gaelic Athletics Association (GAA) content for inspiration. Attached is one of the better ads for Irish women’s football… Read more »
An ingenious 2020 Irish production by Meangadh Fíbín (for TG4 – the Irish langauge content creator and broadcaster) just recently picked up the ‘Most Original and Innovative’ award at the Prix Circom Awards ceremony. ‘Samhlú’ (which means ‘fancy’ or ‘imagination’) was a cultural showcase celebrating artistic endeavour and creativity in Ireland thorugh that very challenging… Read more »
It’s interesting when you use different languages for what’s supposed to be the same thing or the same word defining the ‘thing’. The problem, of course, is that langauge is culturally-based and, often, a word cannot be directly translated or even explained without a good understanding of the culture in question. In English, the word… Read more »
Attached are some conceptual images we used during the development of the Dark Dawn project. Here’s a bit of the draft media release: The latest product from IRISH IMBAS is ‘Caomhaoir Fuilsmeartha/ Dark Dawn’. An experimental narrative project, told in both Irish and English, it relates the story of a dying warrior’s attempts to protect… Read more »
In terms of plot patterns, ‘Peaky Blinders’ is probably one of the best shows on television at the moment and I’ve had a lot of respect for the writer Stephen Knight ever since seeing his startlingly innovative series ‘Taboo’ with Tom Hardy. This interesting interesting post from the Irish Times shows some of the links… Read more »
With crazy workloads and various schedule upsets last year (not looking at you, Covid!), Liath Luachra 3 (The Seeking) was one of the main projects I was working on to suffer unexpected delays. Originally, my intention had been to release the final book in December 2020, but the on again-off again nature of the way… Read more »
Wondering what’s going on with FIONN 4 (Fionn: Stranger at Mullán Bán)? Although I completed seven chapters of this book last year, the potential television series for Liath Luachra: The Grey One meant I had to transfer all my time to finishing the next Liath Luachra book instead. As a result, this has remained languishing… Read more »
Ireland: 192 A.D. A time of strife and treachery. Ireland 2020: Somewhat similar but now we have the Covid-19 virus as well. Just for information, I’ve set up a new cover for the digital version of FIONN: Defence of Rath Bladhma which you can see above. The paperback version (currently only at Amazon – here)… Read more »
