For many years, the conventional wisdom about Nora Barnacle, James Joyce's longtime companion and eventually his wife, was that she was an ignorant but "country cute" peasant from Galway with an unaccountable hold on the great writer, whose work she disdained. How could Joyce have lived all those years with a woman who refused to read Ulysses? Her very name was an excuse for … [Read more...] about Film Forum: James Joyce in Love
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Music: Traditional Music Roundup
Mirth-Making Heroes There are folks who think of "Celtic" music as a gently soothing, slightly ethereal style, heavy on the harps and tin whistles. They haven't heard At the Racket, a fun-loving bunch who prefer their jigs and reels on the saxophone and tenor banjo. This "racket" is actually the sort of whoop-it-up band you might have heard at a Saturday night dance in … [Read more...] about Music: Traditional Music Roundup
Sláinte! The Irish Roots of Halloween
Ask anyone to name five favorite holidays, and it's a sure bet Halloween will be on the list. Then ask how the celebration came to be. More than likely you'll be told Halloween means All Hallows Eve the night of prayer preceding the Feast of All Saints. Yes, but there's more to it than that. The night we celebrate by dressing in outlandish costumes and traipsing about the … [Read more...] about Sláinte! The Irish Roots of Halloween
Roots: The Unimportance of Being Mulligan
Irish literature and lore shows Mulligan little respect. The very opening sentence of James Joyce's acclaimed Ulysses introduces Buck Mulligan, a ribald braggart who, before many pages, is borrowing a quid to "get gloriously drunk so as to astonish the druidy druids," making an utter fool of himself in a "jester's dress of puce and yellow and a clown's cap" and identifying … [Read more...] about Roots: The Unimportance of Being Mulligan
The Last Word: The Far Side of Revenge
There was a terrible silence in Omagh in the days after the bombing. It seemed that not even birdsong could be heard in a town that was full of life and joy and laughter when the world turned upside down on 15 August 1998. To those who know nothing of Northern Ireland it may seem distasteful to engage in the arithmetic of tragedy, but the difference with Omagh was that the … [Read more...] about The Last Word: The Far Side of Revenge