Expatiate (on or upon): enlarge upon (e.g., a theme or topic), in discourse, argument, or writing.
Clagairt + 35 more: rain.
The first of these I came upon through reading Henry James and Queer Modernity.
The second was discovered on a short detour down a rabbit-hole. While writing a review of Manchán Magan’s Thirty-Two Words for Field, I recalled the cliché about Inuit having an unusually large number of words for snow (some of which appear in one of my favourite books, Miss Smilla’s Feeling for Snow). Assuming that Irish must have a reasonable number of words for rain, I found a 2006 article in the Irish Times providing no fewer than thirty-six of them, listed by Breandán Ó Cróinín. We’ve had need of all thirty-six of them so far this month: showery weather, light sprinkles, downpours, the lot.
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| Eyewitness footage of some of the 36 types of Irish rain that fell in 2018 |
Doing a little research for the next WIP, I took out a book of Laois Folk Tales (Nuala Hayes), which I had glanced through but never read. In the chapter 'Four Saints and the Book of Leinster', I came across a tale of St. Patrick; it is the sort of story I always find attractive because of the casual mix of Christianity and paganism.
The way that folklore and religion could sometimes blend confused me in my youth; I recall hearing stories (in school) ostensibly about, for example, the Virgin Mary where she interacts with St. Bridget. Why, I asked myself, was St. Bridget hoofing it about in the Middle East and how was she a saint before Christ was born?
Anyway, in this story, St. Patrick is on his way from Kilkenny into Munster. He had to cross part of Laois, and was not well received; the locals threw stones at him. He cursed them (very clearly: “I curse Uí Duachi,” the place in question) three times, with the result that even now the wind demolishes haystacks, the tops of the rushes wither, and the River Dinen is "subject to devastating floods." Laying curses just does not seem a terribly… episcopal… approach to the flock.
Another thing I came across in this book: I did not know that the Book of Leinster came from Stradbally, and used to be in the possession of Rory O’More.I came across this a few weeks ago and, even better for a non-speaker of Irish, not one but two recent translations into English.
Cré na Cille was written in 1949 by Máirtín Ó Cadhain (1906-1970) and published by Sairséal agus Dill, but it was not translated in English until 2015 (as The Dirty Dust) by Alan Titley (who recently translated the Táin Bó Cúailnge for Little Island). and as Graveyard Clay in 2016 by Liam Mac Con Iomaire and Tim Robinson.
The book is composed of internal monologues of, and dialogues between, the dead in a particular graveyard, and Ó Cadhain wrote it in the Connemara Irish that he spoke himself, the vernacular ‘speech of the people’ where he lived, and the characters are violent, jealous, and petty.
The two translations use quite different language, and it is difficult, if you are relying heavily on a dictionary, to know which is the more ‘correct’, especially when it comes to invective and strong language. Titley’s language is much earthier (“Fuck them if they…”, “…and then the bullshit…”) compared to Mac Con Iomaire (“Did the devil possess them to…”, “…and the song and dance…”). Apparently, Cré na Cille was translated not only into English, but German, Dutch, and Czech as well.
I have not got very far in the book, as I am also reading for a journal article, as well as Lispector’s Hour of the Star, but happily Cré na Cille is a very, very long way from Peig (though possibly the uncensored Peig Sayers might have been a bit more Ó Cadhain…)
Here at BdR, we have been preparing a media pack, which will contain a Q&A sheet. As a member of ALLi, I had plenty of resources to hand, including sample questions. It was a great help, but, alas! fell short of spoon-feeding me with sample answers, which meant I had to think hard about a few things.
One of the questions was about when I decided I wanted to be a writer. It’s a difficult one to answer, particularly because when I was very young, I was more likely to draw than to write, and it wasn't easy to pin down a turning point. In search of inspiration, I checked out a few other writers and what they had to say about their formative years, and came across Neil Gaiman’s enthusiasm for The Voyage of the Dawn Treader, which is also one of my favourite Narnia books.
Gaiman also named Lud-in-the-Mist as the book he wished he had written (I love it, and also his introduction to it) and A Humument as the book he gives as a gift; the very same book I received as a gift two Christmases ago, although not from Neil Gaiman which would have been, frankly, weird (though wonderful).
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1 comment:
Great medley of information, I particularly love the 35 words for rain! :)
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