http://www.gaelport.com/index.php?page=clippings&id=1282&viewby=date

quote:

In the meantime, English is, as Michael Hartnett in one of his later poems remarked, "the perfect language to sell pigs in". We will all continue to use it at such a level, but quantity is not quality.

Cléireach a bhfuil máistreacht ar a pheann aige, sa dá theanga, ambaist!

Sea! Ba mhaith an Cléireachas sa litir seo.

Interesting letter. I suppose all languages have their literary giants. Unfortunately in America many are not ever mentioned at school, I hadn't heard of the French and Spanish ones that the letter writer mentioned, much less the Irish examples.

Beir bua agus beannacht

I recommend reading "How the Irish Saved Civilization" by Thomas Cahill...very interesting. It gives the Irish culture a very nice, and very deserving, pat on the back...plus it's a good history read for those of you out there who would rather learn about their own world rather than that of wizards, witches, and muggles.

Really? I don't think so Riona, How the Irish Saved Civilization was required reading for my school! Very good book, by the way. We also studied William Yeats' work, Don Quixote, and Les Miserables, to name a few.

(Message edited by odwyer on August 08, 2006)

In my public high school I did Voltaire, but that was about it for the major non-British/American lit crowd. As an English teacher in a private school, on the curriculum there were none. We did read Native American legends but no non-British Europeans. I had to add my own as I had time...the Táin Bó Cuailnge one year with the AP class (downloaded the parallel text online, printed out all 250 pages and paid out of my own pocket to photocopy a class set of 17 and put them all in binders!)

As for Irish writers I also worked in much Yeats, Heaney and Guests of the Nation (Frank O'Connor) with my creative writing class. Did a bunch of Yeats and Heaney with the world lit classes along with A Modest Proposal, but had to limit the American and 'British' authors there. Not that we read others of major note, mostly folktales from non-European cultures. Sad, really. American lit was for US writers, British lit was for British and Irish writers and world lit was for South American (not in 'American' lit!), African and Asian writers. Oh yes, one French short story, The Necklace by Guy de Maupassant, but otherwise no European representation. No Cervantes, Goethe nor Chekov )=

To introduce poetry to both the lit classes and my writing classes I used to give them a poem in Irish and have them "translate" it. Not really, but to make a mock-translation in which they formulated their own poems on the perceived framework of meter, rhyme and repetition in what they were given. Inevitably they would ask, "Mr V, what language is that?" and the usual instructive conversation would ensue...

But yes, what they were taught about major writers from the non-American/British tradition was done by me "under the table" and not because it actually made it onto the curriculum. Since I took French in school, that was where I drew most of it from, but I was only able to work a few in there because I wasn't supposed to.

Okay, I'm rambling. Sorry.

A Antaine a chara,

I remember when you posted that poem about the mole up for us, telling about your poetry translation excercise. Really a clever idea and a great way to get the kids to know about Irish and that, yes, it is a language. I read The Necklace over winter term, what a downer, I felt like I got tossed off of a cliff at the end because my stomach went down so far after finding out that the necklace was a fake, I know this sounds lame, but when you're in an exceptionally boring class anything that isn't monotone or with mild surprise is nice. :)

Beir bua agus beannacht

> I suppose all languages have their literary giants.

Not necessarily. Some languages have never been written down. (Sorry, couldn't resist the temptation to nit-pick!)

An gá do litríocht a bheith scríofa?

Bheadh Homer ina fhathach, dar liom, faoi munar scríobh aoinne síos rud ar bith a dúirt sé. Agus céard faoi Socrates?

Cá bhfios cén seoda a chaill muid de bharr gan iad a bheith scríofa síos?

A Riona, a chara,

We studied the Necklace last year. Half of us felt sorry for the girl, the other half, myself included, thought she was a brat and deserved it. She was changed for the better by the experience, I thought.

My students, by and large, were angry with the author for creating the whole situation.

I found it very interesting, while teaching, to see how people who don't read critically approach literature when they finally do start.

Like I said, I taught in a private high school and a not-so-insignificant number of my students had never read a play, complete short story or novel, or really read a poem. Some had read Goosebumps or other young adult stuff as their only reading material.

I could not imagine living 16 or 17 years in the compusory school system of a highly literate society without every touching literature in any form, but many of my students had managed to pull that off.

I read anything I can get my hands on. That is, execpt for goosebumps. Never read one of those. :P

BTW, in case anyone is interedted, I am leaving for a two week vacation in the Highlands of Scotland in two hours. If I can find a computer while on my trip, I will be sure to get back to you all.

I hope you have lots of fun and I hope you can get to some place whare someone speaks Gaelic. It would be so neat if you went to the Hebrides while you are there.

Slan lit

The quote from Michael Hartnett reminded me of a passage in R.S. Thomas's autobiography "Neb" (No-one). Thomas is considered by many to be the greatest Welsh poet in English of the latter half of the 20th century. And he had a stormy relationship with English--his first language. He hated it.

Thomas was a Anglican priest and he was given to lecturing his flock on the dangers to the continued existence of Welsh and on the virtures of Cymdeithas yr Iaith Gymraeg (The Society of the Welsh Language). He usually got no reaction. But one day he met a couple in the congregation who were not residents of the parish, and they were very interested. Here is how he described them:

"The man, Jack Roberts, had worked for a firm in London, and because the work had taken him here and there in Europe, he had mastered five or more languages, including Welsh, Russian, French, Spanish, and English. He had a fairly good knowledge of Breton, and was also trying to get to grips with Basque. English was at the end of this list on purpose. It was of all the languages, the one he hated most , and since his wife Siani was a Welsh woman, he was under no cumpulsion to speak English."

Interesting quote in that Thomas felt that he was under a cumpulsion to write poetry in English. He agonized over the fact that since Welsh was not his mother tongue he could never be a good poet in Welsh.

That he was somehow able to put this tension to good use is illustrated by this passage from one of his poems describing an encounter with Saunders Lewis, probably the greatest Welsh language literary figure of the 20th century:

And finally he,
the small man with the big
heart whom I met once
in our pretending capital,
taking my hand in both
his and soothing my quarrel
with my English muse with,
'But all art is born out of tension'.

I remember eading an interview with Máire Mhac an tSaoi in the "Southern Review" in which she gently chided Michael Harnett for going back to writing poems in English after he had said "Farewell to English". I wonder if a similar tension was at work in his work as a poet. Though off hand I do not know if Irish was his first language or not.

Well, Cymdeithas yr Iaith Gymraeg is still at it. R.S. would be happy. Their latest direct action campaign strikes at one of the tentacles of the Seattle Coffee Empire, so it really got my attention:

http://cymdeithas.org/2006/01/03/rali_calan_deddf_iaith.html#rhagor

The be-sloganed cafe now reads: WHERE IS THE WELSH?

Cymdeithas was formed in 1962 after Saunder Lewis's famous radio lecture Tynged yr Iaith (The Fate of the Language). It has a long history of non-violent direct action in defense of the Welsh language, and of prison sentences for those actions.

And they are still at it. They want to revise the 93 Welsh Language Act to make Welsh the other official language and to include the private sector withn the Act's reach. Direct actions continue:

http://cymdeithas.org/2006/08/01/another_member_of_cymdeithas_yr_iaith_in_court. html#rhagor

Máirtín Ó Cadhain was so impressed with the Lewis's lecture that he translated it from Welsh into Irish as "Báis nó Beatha".

That was really interesting a William a chara.

Am I right that this translation of Martin's equals "Death or Life" in Bearla, really says something about his imterpretation of the importance of that lecture.

Beir bua agus beannacht