“I’ll never forget reading his first short poems in the early sixties; they had a kind of hypnotic power, as if a new Orpheus had emerged from Newcastle West. He was Limerick’s Lorca.” — Seamus Heaney on Mícheál Ó hAirtnéide
Michael Hartnett (if we must) grew up in Limerick. His childhood was tough. 19th century tough. Two of his siblings died when they were babies. He spent much time with his Irish-speaking grandmother. He grew up in a section of Ireland rich with language and folk traditions. He always knew he had to escape, but there was a part of him always turning back to this place. Those tensions fill his body of work.
He moved to London as a young man, and took odd jobs here and there. He started getting published regularly. In the 1970s, a terrible time in Ireland, he decided to write only in the Irish language. He wrote an entire book called Farewell to English. At the time, it was a very unpopular move. He didn’t care (he never did). He was rebellious.
Since he grew up as a child hearing Irish all the time, conversational casual Irish, not used as a political or cultural weapon, he saw the language differently. There was nothing nostalgic about why he did what he did. He wasn’t trying to prop up something, or breathe life into something that was supposedly “dead”. In its way, of course, as is so often the case with all things Irish, there was a political element to his decision to write only in Irish.
Eventually, he did write in English. He experimented with different forms. He was fascinated by haikus and wrote them. Critics pushed back. (Critics: stop doing this. Be more open. Stop wanting artists to stay put and/or repeat themselves).
After a lifetime of heavy drinking, Hartnett in 1999. I found this piece by Conor O’Callaghan really illuminating. Lots of great anecdotes. A prickly figure and a prickly legacy.
I’ll post one of his Irish-language poems today, with a translation in English below it. I am not fluent in Irish (although I once had a magic moment of near-comprehension). But I know the sounds, and his work “sounds” better in Irish. The rhymes are mellifluous, effortless. Also, Sullivan is my mother’s maiden name. So that’s why I’m choosing this one.
Fís Dheireanach Eoghain Rua Uí Shúilleabháin
Do thál bó na maidine
ceo bainne ar gach gleann
is tháinig glór cos anall
ó shleasa bána na mbeann.
Chonaic mé, mar scáileanna,
mo spailpíní fánacha,
is in ionad sleán nó rámhainn acu
bhí rós ar ghualainn chách.
The Last Vision of Eoghan Rua Ó Súilleabháin
The cow of morning spurted
milk-mist on each glen
and the noise of feet came
from the hill’ white sides.
I saw like phantoms
my fellow-workers
and instead of spades and shovels
they had roses on their shoulders.
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