UCD’s boycott of the canonisation of Cardinal Newman depresses me. The greatest prose writer in English of the 19th Century, according to James Joyce and one of the great intellectuals of his age and a man of integrity. One doesn’t have to be a Catholic nor a believer in any religion to recognise generosity of spirit wherever it exists,
Meanness of spirit pervades official Ireland. The Minister of Education’s restoration of History as a core subject may be an exception, provided he does not instruct teachers, as Paddy Cooney once did, that the IRA is or was the source of all violence there. The downgrading of Irish is perverse and stupid. Without it we are
strangers in our own country. How many Dubliners know what GLENAGEARY means? Gleann na gCaoraigk. Is Carnew named to differentiate it from an Old Banger? It’s proper name is Corn an Bhua – the Cup of Victory. It was a wonderful discovery of a village on top of a Carlow hill. Commemorating a fight? Tug of war? Horse race? A stimulus to endless speculation.
The National Museum in Collins Barracks has just one small glass case to commemorate the Centenary of Dail Eireann. The failure of the State and the Universities to reprint THE IRISH BULLETIN is treasonable. All the memoirs published by veterans should be reprinted. If necessary with State funds. But I suspect they would be a commercial success if properly promoted.
I could go on and on, but you and Aubane know the score and, with luck, the gates of Hell shall not prevail against you.
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