![]() Are we to deny her inalienable protest against the circumstances of that life? All her life, to judge from these texts, she continued to question and struggle to accept what she saw as the divine arrangements which permitted such grief and heartbreak. Her life story gives luminous witness to the ordinary fate of the poor, and in particular to the lives of women - many births, multiple infant deaths, early widowhood, loss of her grown family to emigration or death - in an age of bare subsistence and a place of physical exposure, danger and isolation. ![]() I have also come to revere her as a representative figure in Irish history one of a whole class of unregarded people who toiled lifelong, she yet kept her dignity and that gift of intense consciousness of life which marks an artist and a bearer of verbal art. Indeed, a central part of my argument was that this specifically literary achievement has been somewhat undervalued, having been understandably eclipsed by her other identity as oral storyteller. If Fr Moore had been present he would have heard how warmly I share his admiration and respect for Peig and for the skill, intelligence and beauty of her writing as narrative art. Do we not owe both these people, and all those others whom these books so vividly represent, the honesty to acknowledge such feelings? Or are we to pretend that Blasket life was an idyll? This is that Peig in her youth sharply resented the economic circumstances of her life, and still felt strongly enough about this in her old age to communicate the feeling to her son Micheal O Gaoithin when together they put together the volumes of her autobiography. I did indeed point to an element in Peig's thought which anyone who reads the three books in question (not just Peig, but also Machtnamh SheanaMhna and Beatha Pheig Sayers) can see for themselves, though it was not generally emphasised in the received version of Peig's life as enshrined in our national ideology for so many decades. For the record, I did not say that Peig Sayers was a feminist. Podcasts are available for download directly from SoundCloud or via iTunes.Sir, - Fr Pat Moore writes critically (April 6th) about my discussion of Peig Sayers at Comoradh an Bhlascaoid. Host Jonny Dillon hopes this tour through the folklore furrow will appeal to those who wish to learn about the richness and depth of their traditional cultural inheritance that a knowledge and understanding of our past might inform our present and guide our future. Blúiríní Béaloidis 37 is online now, I hope you'll join Pádraig, Éilís and I as we ask 'who was that Peig Sayers'? Blúiríní Béaloidis Folklore Podcastīluiríní Béaloidis is the podcast from The National Folklore Collection, University College Dublin, and is a platform to explore Irish and wider European folk tradition across an array of subject areas and topics. Pádraig Ó Héalaí, in the beautiful surrounds of the Museum of Literature Ireland and for the first time in front of a live studio audience - something which was a great pleasure for me personally! Thanks to my guests Éilís and Pádraig, to our friends at MoLI for taking such good care of us on the night and especially to all who came along in person and made the evening so pleasant! This podcast also marks the launch of Thar Bealach Isteach / Into the Island, a nine month collaborative exhibition between MoLI and the NFC, which looks at Peig Sayers and the Blasket Island storytelling tradition. ![]() ![]() For episode 37 of Blúiríní, I was honoured to have been joined by Dr. Now, nearly sixty-five years after her death, we hope to provide a platform through which her tales might find a new audience, one which, it is hoped, may find in her a source of inspiration and insight. This green bench where she used to do the studying will be a domicile for the birds of the wilderness, and the little house where she used to eat and drink, it's unlikely there'll be a trace of it there." For this episode of Blúiríní, instead of focusing on one aspect of tradition, we for the first time dedicate our explorations to one individual Mairéad ‘Peig’ Sayers who, by her artistry and mastery as a storyteller in the oral tradition, skilfully managed to express the wisdom of the many in the wit of the few, and yet whose printed autobiographies (as Irene Lucchitti notes in an article in Folklore and Modern Irish writing) ‘experienced a decline in reputation, suffering critical disdain and schoolyard ridicule in equal measure’. A person here and a person there will say, maybe, 'Who was that Peig Sayers?' but poor Peig will be the length of their shout from them. Someone else will have pastime out of my work when I'm gone on the way of truth. "Long as the day is, night comes, and alas, the night is coming for me too.
0 Comments
Leave a Reply. |
AuthorWrite something about yourself. No need to be fancy, just an overview. ArchivesCategories |