Professional Documents
Culture Documents
Curs Optional Engleza Celtic Paradigm
Curs Optional Engleza Celtic Paradigm
Faculty of Letters
Course tutor:
Associate Professor Ioana Mohor-Ivan
Cuprins
Cuprins
Obiective. Tematica 4
Chapter 1 - Beginnings in the Celtic World 5
1.1. Celtic Tribes 5
1.2. Celtic Society 6
1.3. Celtic Religion 6
1.4. Celtic Literature 7
Chapter 2 - The Mythological Cycle and Its Modern Reworkings 8
2.1. The Mythic Invasions 8
2.2. The Celtic Pantheon 8
2.3. The Milesians 12
2.4. The World of the Sidhe 13
2.5. The Sidhe in W.B. Yeats’s Early Poems 14
2.6. The Sidhe with Contemporary Women Poets 18
Chapter 3 - The Ulster Cycle and the Celtic Hero 22
3.1. The Ulster (Red Branch ) Cycle 22
3.2. Emáin Macha 22
3.3. Main Characters of the Cycle 24
3.4. Main Tales of the Cycle 24
3.4.1. The Exile of the Sons of Uísneach 24
3.4.2. Táin Bó Cuailnge (The Cattle Raid of Cooley) 26
3.4.3. Táin Bó Fraoch (The Cattle Raid of Fraoch) 29
3.5. Celtic Myth in the Theatre of Yeats: 30
3.5.1. The Cuchulain Cycle of Plays 30
3.6. De-Constructing Heroism: Nuala Ni Dhumnaill’s 35
Chapter 4 - The Cycle of Munster (the Finn Cycle) 37
4.1. The Fionn Cycle (Fenian, Ossianic, Munster) 37
4.2. Fenian Heroes and Tales 37
4.3. Oísin in the Land of Youth 38
4.4. Literary Treatments of Fenian Tales and Heroes 42
4. 4. 1. Ossianism 43
4. 4. 2. W. B. Yeats, “The Wanderings of Oisin” 43
4. 4. 3. Finn Maccool, from “Finnegan’s Wake” to Joyce’s
“Finnegans Wake” 43
Chapter 5 - The King (Historical) Cycle of Tales 46
5.1. The Historical (King) Cycle: 46
5.1.1. Buile Suibhne (Frenzy of Sweeney) 46
5.2. Early Irish Poetry 48
5.3. The “Suibhne” Motif in Irish Literature 49
5.3.1. Flann O’Brien (Brian Ó Núalláin) (1911-66): 49
5.3.1.1. At Swim-Two Birds (1939) 49
5.3.2. Seamus Heaney (1939 - ) 51
5.3.2.1. Sweeney Astray (1983) 54
Minimal Bibliography 57
Obiective:
Tematica:
Around 800 B.C., Ireland was settled by a Q-Celtic people, the Gaels, who
spread through the whole island. In the course of the next centuries, a
number of historical provinces came into being:
a) Ulster (Ulaid), in the north of Ireland;
b) Munster (Mumu), in the south of Ireland;
c) Connacht (Connachta), in the west of Ireland;
d) Leinster (Laigin), in the east of Ireland;
e) Meath (Mide), the residence of Ireland’s High Kings, in the middle,
with Tara as its capital.
The Hill of Tara, known as "Teamhair", was once the ancient seat of power in
Ireland – 142 kings are said to have reigned here in prehistoric and historic
times. In ancient Irish religion and mythology Tara was the sacred place of
After the arrival of Christianity and the adaptation of the Latin alphabet to the
Irish language, the tales are collected and incorporated into four main cycles,
namely:
• Mythological
• Ulster (The Red Branch)
• Finn (Fenian, Munster)
• King (historical)
Task:
Write a 4000-word essay on “Cultural Landmarks of the Celtic World”.
When they reached Ireland and landed on the western shore, they set
fire to their boats so that there would be no turning back. The smoke
from the burning boats darkened the sun and filled the land for three
days, and the Fir Bolgs thought the Tuatha De Danaan had arrived in
a magic mist.
The invaders brought with them the four great treasures of their tribe.
From Falias they brought Lia Fail, the Stone of Destiny. They brought
it to Tara and it screamed when a rightful king of Ireland sat on it.
From Gorias they brought Lugh’s spear. Anyone who held it was
invincible in battle. From Findias they brought Nuada’s irresistible
sword. No one could escape it once it was unsheathed. From Murias
they brought the Dagda’s cauldron. No one ever left it hungry.
Nuada was the king of the Tuatha De Danaan and he led them against
the Fir Bolgs. They fought a fierce battle on the Plain of Moytura, the
first one the Tuatha De Danaan fought in a pace of that name.
Thousands of the Fir Bolgs were killed, a hundred thousand in all, and
among them their king, Eochai Mac Erc. Many of the Tuatha De
Danaan died too, and their king, Nuada, had his arm severed from his
body in the fight.
In the end the Tuatha De Danaan overcame the Fir Bolgs and routed
them until only a handful of them survived. These survivors boarded
their ships and set sail to the far-scattered islands around Ireland.
When the Fir Bolgs had fled, the Tuatha De Danaan took over the
country and went with their treasures to Tara to establish themselves
as masters of the island. But another struggle lay ahead. Though they
had defeated the Fir Bolgs, a more powerful enemy awaited them.
These were the Formorians, a demon-like race who lived in the
islands to which the Fir Bolgs had fled.
(from Marie Heaney, Over Nine Waves, London, Faber and Faber,
1994.)
Then Lir came to the edge of the lake, and he took notice of the swans
having the voice of living people, and he asked them why was it they
had that voice.
“I will tell you that, Lir,” said Fionnuala. “We are your own four
children, that are after being destroyed by your wife and by the sister
of our own mother, through the dint of her jealousy.” “Is there any way
to put you into your own shapes again?” said Lir. “there is no way,”
said Fionnuala, “for all the men of the world could not help us till we
have gone through our time, and that will not be,” she said, “till the end
of nine hundred years.”
When Lir and his people heard that, they gave out three great
heavy shouts of grief and sorrow and crying.
“Is there a mind with you,” said Lir, “to come to us on the land, since
you have your own sense and your memory yet?” “We have not the
power,” said Fionnuala, “to live with any person at all from this time;
but we have our language, the Irish, and we have the power to sing
sweet music, and it is enough to satisfy the whole race of men to be
listening to that music. And let you stop here tonight,” she said, “and
we will be making music for you.”
So Lir and his people stopped there listening to the music of the
swans, and they slept there quietly that night. And Lir rose up early on
the morning of the morrow and he made this complaint: —
“It is time to go from this place. I do not sleep though I am in my
lying down. To be parted from my dear children, it is that is tormenting
my heart.
“It is a bad net I put over you, bringing Aoife, daughter of Oilell of
Aran, to the house. I would never have followed that advice if I had
known what it would bring upon me.
“O Fionnuala, and comely Conn, O Aodh, O Fiachra of the beautiful
arms; it is not ready I am to go away from you, from the border of the
harbour where you are.”
Then Lir went on to the palace of Bodb Dearg, and there was a
welcome before him there; and he got a reproach from Bodb Dearg for
not bringing his children along with him. “My grief!” said Lir. “It is not I
that would not bring my children along with me; it was Aoife there
beyond, your own foster-child and the sister of their mother, that put
them in the shape of four swans on Loch Dairbhreach, in the sight of
the whole of the men of Ireland; but they have their sense with them
yet, and their reason, and their voice, and their Irish.”
Bodb Dearg gave a great start when he heard that, and he knew
what Lir said was true, and he gave a very sharp reproach to Aoife,
and he said: “This treachery will be worse for yourself in the end,
Aoife, than to the children of Lir. And what shape would you yourself
think worst of being in?” he said.
“I would think worst of being a witch of the air,” she said. “It is into
that shape I will put you now,” said Bodb. And with that he struck her
with a Druid wand, and she was turned into a witch of the air there and
then, and she went away on the wind in that shape, and she is in it
yet, and will be in it to the end of life and time.
“Cath Maige Tuired” (“The Battle of the Plain of Tuired”) is the best-known
tale of the cycle, dealing specifically with the climactic battle between the
Tuatha and the Fomori. The God Lugh assumes the leadership of the tutha
and leads them to victory after he himself kills Balor of the Evil Eye, the most
formidable of the fomori. Lugh becomes thus a divine archetype of kingship,
while he is also the Samildánach (“the many-gifted one”), mastering all the
arts and the crafts, moving between all the activities of society and be patron
of each one.
The Irish female deities usually indicate sexuality and fertility, with powerful
magical and warlike connotations. There are five goddesses identified with
war, and inspiring battle madness. The Morrígan ("terror" or "phantom
queen") is the greatest of them, being associated with war and death on the
battlefield, sometime appearing in the form of a carrion crow. Other
goddesses of war are the Badb (fury), Dea (the hateful one) Nemain
(frenzy), while Macha (who is also goddess of the horses) is also included
here. Another triad is formed by the goddesses identified with the sovranty
and spirit of Ireland, represented as three sisters, Eire, Banba and Fotla.
Some of these deities attracted singular worship, associated with the
festivals that marked the Celtic year:
• Samhain: celebrated around 31 October, it began the Celtic year. It
was a time when the veil between this world and the Otherworld was
thought to be so thin that the dead could return to warm themselves at
the hearths of the living, and some of the living - especially poets -
were able to enter the Otherworld through the doorways of the sidhe,
such as that at the Hill of Tara in Ireland.
• Imbolc (or Oimelc) celebrated at lambing time, around 31 January, it
marked the beginning of the end of winter. Women met to celebrate
the return of the maiden aspect of the Goddess Brigid.
• Beltain, celebrated around 1 May, was a fire festival sacred to the god
Belenos, the Shining One. Cattle were let out of winter quarters and
driven between two fires in a ritual cleansing ceremony that may have
had practical purposes too. It was a time for feasts and fairs and for
the mating of animals.
• Lughnasadh was a summer festival lasting for two weeks that fell
around 31 July. It was said to have been introduced to Ireland by the
god Lugh, and so was sacred to this god. This festival was celebrated
with competitions of skill, including horse-racing (perhaps this is why
the festival was also linked to the goddess Macha)
The three sister goddesses of the Dé Danann, Banba, Fodla and Eriu,
asked the Milesians to name Ireland after one of them. It was Eriu who won
the honour. Ireland became known as Erin or Erinn.
The Tuatha Dé Danann, though defeated, did not leave Erin, but continued to
live there, with their conquerors. Manannan (in other accounts, the Dagda)
placed a powerful spell of invisibility over the many parts of Ireland; magical
palaces were hidden under the mound. The places were called Sidh or
Sidhe. The Tuatha Dé Danann became spirit people, or fairies.
It is the early poems that Yeats draws heavily on Irish myth, employing
mythological figures and mythic motifs alongside with theories drawn from
occult writings (in which he was also interested.) Though dissimilar at a first
glance, the two areas bear comparison in several aspects:
• The ‘natural’ (world in time, manifestation) as opposed to the
‘supernatural’ (that which is beyond manifestation);
• Metaphysical content;
• The exile, the quest, the voyage: symbols of the spirit’s journey from
life to death.
On the basis of these, Yeats constructs his own system of opposites, which
may be seen to inform his poetry:
Spirit Matter
Imagination Reason
Eternal Ephemeral
Immortal Mortal
Id Ego
Night Day
In “The Stolen Child” (a poem based on Irish legend) the faeries beguile a
child (presumably in a dream) to come away with them.
Such points of contact between the two worlds allow for visionary states, able
to produce artistic creation. But, usually, this involves a great cost: the
dreamers (like the one in “The Man Who Dreamed of Fairyland”) remain
caught in-between the two, never allowed to find comfort in this life, for their
thoughts are constantly turned to the world of the imagination, or spirit.
The Man who Dreamed of Faeryland
He stood among a crowd at Drumahair;
His heart hung all upon a silken dress,
And he had known at last some tenderness,
Before earth took him to her stony care;
But when a man poured fish into a pile,
It seemed they raised their little silver heads,
And sang what gold morning or evening sheds
Upon a woven world-forgotten isle
The Celtic Paradigm in Modern Irish Writing 17
Chapter 2 – The Mythological Cycle and Its Modern Reworkings
Where people love beside the ravelled seas;
That Time can never mar a lover’s vows
Under that woven changeless roof of boughs:
The singing shook him out of his new ease.
The daughter of an Irish diplomat Eavan Boland (1944-) spent much of her
youth living in London and New York City.
One of Ireland's few recognized women poets, Boland addresses broad
issues of Irish national identity as well as the specific issues confronting
women and mothers in a culture that has traditionally ignored their
experiences. As she herself has stated,
“As an Irish woman poet I have very little precedent. There were none in
the 19th century or early part of the 20th century. You didn’t have a
thriving sense of the witness of the lived life of women poets, and what
you did have was a very compelling and at time oppressive relationship
between Irish poetry and the national tradition.”
In Boland’s view “… we all [women] exist in a mesh, web, labyrinth of
associations … we ourselves are constructed by the construct … images are
not ornaments, they are truths.”
Her collections of poems include In Her Own Image (1980), Night Feed
(1982), Outside History (1990), In a Time of Violence (1994).
She has also written a prose memoir, Object Lessons: The Life of the
Woman and the Poet in Our Time (1995).
In “The Woman Turns herself Into A Fish”, Boland engages directly with
Yeats’s “The Song of the Wondering Aengus”, re-writing the mermaid image:
it’s done:
I turn,
I flab upward
blub-lipped,
hipless
and I am
sexless
shed
of ecstasy,
a pale
pealing eggs
screamlessly
in seaweed.
It’s what
I set my heart on.
Yet
ruddering
and muscling
in the sunless tons
of new freedoms
still
I feel
a chill pull,
a brightening,
a light, a light
and how
in my loomy cold,
my greens
still
she moons
in me.
Task:
Choose one of the following topics to develop into a 4000-word essay of the
argumentative type:
1. The Celtic Pantheon in its Indo-European Context.
2. The World of the Sidhe with W.B. Yeats and Nuala NiDhumnaill.
3. The Dreamer’s Mermaid or the Mermaid’s Dream? (The Song of the
Wandering Aengus vs. The Woman Turns Herself Into a Fish)
The cycle of Ulster contains a group of heroic tales relating to the Ulaid and
their military order known as the House of the Red Branch.
The main part of the Ulaid Cycle is set during the reigns of Conchobar in
Ulaid (Ulster) and Queen Medb in Connacht (Connaught).
The cycle centers on the greatest hero in Celtic myths, Cú Chulainn (Cu
Chulainn or Cuchulain).
The Ulaid Cycle is supposed to be contemporary to Christ (1st century BC)
since Conchobar's death coincides with the day of Christ’s crucifixion.
Thomas Kinsella, in the “Introduction” to his translation of “The Cattle Raid of
Cooley”, asserts the following:
“The origins of the Tain are far more ancient than these manuscripts [8th
–century manuscripts in which it was preserved]. The language of the
earliest form of the story is dated to the eighth century, but some of the
verse passages may be two centuries older and it is held by most Celtic
scholars that the Ulster cycle, with the rest of early Irish literature, must
have had a long oral existence before it received a literary shape, and a
few traces of Christian colour, at the hands of the monastic scribes. As to
the background of the Tain the Ulster cycle was traditionally believed to
refer to the time of Christ. This might seem to be supported by the
similarity between the barbaric world of the stories, uninfluenced by
Greece or Rome, and the La Tene Iron age civilisation of Gaul and
Britain. The Tain and certain descriptions of Gaulish society by Classical
authors have many details in common: in warfare alone, the individual
weapons, the boastfulness and courage of the warriors, the practices of
cattle-raiding, chariot-fighting and beheading.’
Medb (Maeve) had actually come from the province of Leinster. Her father
was Eochaid Feidlech, king of Tara. Like her three sisters, she was at one
time married to Conchobar Mac Nessa, king of Ulster. She left Conchobar
and became Conchobar's chief enemy throughout the rest of her life.
In Connacht she had three different husbands, who each became king of the
province. As such, Medb represents the Sovereignity of Connacht. The best
known of her husbands was Ailill Mac Mata.
Medb had many children, most of them by Ailill. Apart from her Finnabair and
several other daughters, she also had seven sons, all of them with the name
Maine.
Medb had many lovers, but Fergus Mac Rioch was the best known and was
seen as her most frequent lover.
The Ulaid feasted one day in the house of Fedlimid, the chronicler of
King Conchobar, and as the feast came to an end, a girl-child was
born to the wife of Fedlimid; and a druid prophesied about her future.
[Her name is to be Deirdre. The child will grow to be a woman of
The Celtic Paradigm in Modern Irish Writing 25
Chapter 3 – The Ulster Cycle and the Celtic Hero
wonderful beauty and will cause enmity and trouble and will depart out
of the kingdom. Many will die on account of her.]
The Ulaid proposed to kill the child at once and so avoid the
curse. But Conchobar ordered that she be spared and reared apart,
hidden from men’s eyes; and that he himself would take her for his
wife. So Deirdre was entrusted to foster-parents and was reared in a
dwelling apart. A wise woman, Leborcham, was the only other person
allowed to see her.
Once the girl’s foster-father was flaying a calf outside in the
snow in winter to cook it for her, and she saw a raven drinking the
blood in the snow. Then she said to Leborcham, “Fair would be man
upon whom those three colours should be: his hair like the raven, and
his cheek like the blood, and his body like the snow.” “Grace and
prosperity to you!” said leborcham. “He is not far from you, inside
close by: Naoisi the son of Usnach.” “I shall not be well,” said she,
“until I see him.”
Once that same Naoisi was on the rampart of the fort sounding
his cry. And sweet was the cry of the sons of Usnach. Every cow and
every beast that would hear it used to give two-thirds excess of milk.
For every man who heard it, it was enough of peace and
entertainment. Good was their valour too. Though the whole province
of the Ulaid should be around them in one place, if the three of them
stood back to back, they would not overcome them, for the excellence
of their defence. They were as swift as hounds at the hunt. They used
to kill deer by their speed.
When Naoisi was there outside, soon she went out to him, as
though to go past him, and did not recognise him. “Fair is the heifer
that goes past me,” said he. “Heifers must grow big where there are
no bulls,” said she. “You have the bull of the province,” said he, “the
king of the Ulaid.” “I would choose between you,” said she, “and I
would take a young bull like you.” “No! said he. Then she sprang
toward him and caught his ears. “Here are two ears of shame and
mockery,” said she, “unless you take me with you.”
Naoisi sounded his cry, and the Ulstermen sprang up as they
heard it, and the sons of Usnach, his two brothers, went out to restrain
and warn him. But his honour was challenged. “We shall go into
another country,” said he. “There is not a king in Ireland that will not
make us welcome.” That night they set out with 150 warriors and 150
women and 150 hounds, and Deirdre was with them.
Conchobar pursued them with plots and treachery, and they fled
to Scotland. And they took service with the king of Scotland and built a
house around Deirdre so that they should not be killed on account of
her. One day the steward saw her and told the king of her beauty, so
that he demanded her for wife; and the sons of Usnach had to flee and
take refuge on an island in the sea.
Then Conchobar invited them back and sent Fergus as a surety;
but when they came to Emain, Naoisi and his followers were killed,
and Deirdre was brought to Conchobar, and her hands were bound
behind her back.
When Fergus and Cormac heard of this treachery, they came and did
great deed: three hundred of the Ulaid were killed, and women were
killed, and Emain was burnt by Fergus. And Fergus and Cormac went
Táin Bó Cuailnge is the best known and longest tale of the cycle (closest to
an Old Irish epic.)
Main plot concerns the invasion of Ulster by the army of Connacht led by
Medb who wants to capture the Brown Bull of Cooley.
As the Ulsterman are debilitated by the curse of Macha, Cuchulain (who is
exempt from it) defeats Medb’s army single-handed.
Though the Brown Bull is captured and sent to Cruachain, he kills the White
Bull of Connacht but dies of exhaustion after galloping back to Ulster with his
rival on his back.
There follows a summary of this tale:
TAIN BO CUAILNGE
Once when their royal bed had been made ready for Ailill and Maeve
they conversed as they lay on the pillows. “It is a true saying, girl,” said
Ailill, “that the wife of a good man is well off.” “It is true,” said the girl.
“Why do you say so?” “Because,” said Ailill, “you are better off today
than the day I wed you.” “I was well off without you,” said Maeve. “I
had not heard or known it,” said Ailill, “but that you were an heiress
and that your nearest neighbours were robbing and plundering you.”
“That was not so,” said Maeve, “for my father, Eochu Feidlech son of
FOOL: What a clever man you are though you are blind! There’s
nobody with two eyes in his head that is as clever as you are. Who
but you could have though that the henwife sleeps every day a
little at noon? I would never be able to steal anything if you didn’t
tell me where to look for it. And what a good cook you are! You
take the fowl out of my hands after I have stolen it and plucked it,
and you put it into the big pot at the fire there, and I can go out
and run races with the witches at the edge of the waves and get
an appetite, and when I’ve got it, there’s the hen waiting inside for
me, done to the turn.
BLIND MAN [who is feeling about with his stick]: Done to the turn.
FOOL [putting his arm round Blind Man’s neck]: Come now, I’ll have a
leg and you’ll have a leg, and we’ll draw lots for the wish-bone. I’ll
be praising you while you’re eating it, for your good plans and for
your good cooking. There’s nobody in the world like you, Blind
Man. Come, come. Wait a minute. O shouldn’t have closed the
door. There are some that look for me, and I wouldn’t like them not
to find me. Boann herself out of the river and Fand out of the deep
sea. Witches they are, and they come by in the wind, and they cry,
‘Give a kiss, Fool, give a kiss,’ that’s what they cry. That’s wide
enough. All the witches can come in now. I wouldn’t have them
beat at the door and say, “Where is the Fool? Why has he put a
lock on the door?” Maybe they’ll hear the bubbling of the pot and
come in and sit on the ground. But we won’t give them any of the
fowl. Let them go back to the sea, let them go back to the sea.
BLIND MAN [feeling legs of big chair with his hand] Ah! [Then, in a
louder voice as he feels the back of it]. Ah - ah -
FOOL: Why do you say ‘Ah - ah’?
BLIND MAN: I know the big chair. It is to-day the High King Conchubar
is coming. They have brought out this chair. He is going to be
Cuchulain’s master in earnest from this day out. It is that he’s
coming for.
FOOL: He must be a great man to be Cuchulain’s master.
II.
CUCHULAIN: Because I have killed men without your bidding
And have rewarded others at my own leisure,
Because of half a score of trifling thing,
You’d lay this oath upon me , and now - and now
IV.
FOOL: He is going up to King Conchubar. They are all about the young
man. No, no, he is standing still. There is a great wave going to
break, and he is looking at it. Ah! Now he is running down to the sea,
but he is holding up his sword as if he were going into a fight.
[pause]. Well struck! Well struck!
BLIND MAN: What is he doing now?
FOOL: O! he is fighting the waves!
BLIND MAN: He sees kind Conchubar’s crown on every one of them.
FOOL: There, he has struck at a big one! He has struck the crown off it;
he has made the foam fly. There again, another big one!
BLIN MAN: Where are the kings? What are the kings doing?
FOOL: They are shouting and running down to the shore, and the people
are running out of the houses. They are all running.
BLIND MAN: You say they are running out of the houses? There will be
nobody left in the houses. Listen, Fool!
FOOL: There, he is down! He is up again. He is going out in the deep
water. There is a big wave. It has gone over him. I cannot see him
now. He has killed kings and giants, but the waves have mastered
him, the waves have mastered him!
BLIND MAN: Come here, Fool!
Fool: The waves have mastered him.
BLIND MAN: Come here!
FOOL: The waves have mastered him.
BLIND MAN: Come here, I say.
FOOL [coming towards him, but looking backwards towards the door]:
What is it?
BLIND MAN: There will be nobody in the houses. Come this way; come
quickly! The ovens will be full. We will put our hands into the ovens.
[They go out].
Cú Chulainn I
Grave hunter
who’d satisfy no woman
saying your father never went
to a small seaside town
like Ballybuion
never made arms and instruments of war
to give you
Task
Choose from one of the following topics to develop into a 4000-word essay of
the argumentative type:
1. Tain Bo Cualgne and the Celtic Framework.
2. Constructing and De-constructing Mythic Heroism: representations
of Cuchulain in Tain Bo Cualgne , W. B. Yeats’s “Cuchulain plays”
and Nuala NiDhumnaill’s Chuchulain I.
Hundreds of years after Finn and his companions had died, Saint Patrick
came to Ireland bringing the Christian religion with him. He had heard many
stories about the adventures of the Fianna and he was interested in these old
heroes whom the people spoke about as if they were gods. Their story was
written into the very landscape of Ireland; hills and woods resounded with
their legends, rivers and valleys bore their names, dozens marked their
graves.
One day a feeble, blind old man was brought to Patrick. His body was
weak and wasted but his spirit was strong. Patrick preached the new
doctrines to him but the old warrior scorned the newcomers and their rituals
and in defiant response sand the praises of the Fianna, their code of honour
and their way of life. He said he was Oisin, the son of Finn himself. Patrick
doubted the old man’s word since Finn had been dead for longer than the
span of any human life. So to convince the saint that his claim was true,
Oisin, last of the Fianna, told his story.
After the battle of Gowra, the last battle the Fianna fought, Oisin, Finn
and a handful of survivors went south to Lough Lene in Kerry, a favourite
haunt of theirs in happier times. They were dispirited because they knew their
day was over. They had all fought many battles in their time, but this last
battle had brought them total defeat and bitter losses. Many of their
companions had been killed at Gowra, among them the bravest warrior of the
Fianna, Oisin’s own son, Oscar. When Finn, the baule-hardened old veteran,
had seen his favourite grandson lying dead on the field, he had turned his
back to his troops and wept. Only once before had the Fianna seen their
leader cry and that was at the death of his staghound Bran.
Around Lough Lene the woods were fresh and green and the early
mists of a May morning were beginning to lift when Finn and his followers set
out with their dogs to hunt. The beauty of the countryside and the prospect of
the chase revived their spirits a little as they followed the hounds through the
woods. Suddenly a young hornless deer broke cover and bounded through
the forest with the dogs in full cry at its heels. The Fianna followed them,
rejuvenated by the familiar excitement of the chase.
They were stopped in their tracks by the sight of a lovely young
woman galloping towards them on a supple, nimble white horse. She was so
beautiful she seemed like a vision. She wore a crown and her hair hung in
shining, golden loops down over her shoulders. Her long, lustrous cloak,
glinting with gold-embroidered stars, hung down over the silk trapping of her
horse. Her eyes were as clear and blue as the May sky above the forest and
they sparkled like dew on the morning grass. Her skin glowed white and pink
and her mouth seemed as sweet as honeyed wine. Her horse was saddled
and shod with gold and there was a silver wreath around his head. No one
had seen a better animal.
The woman reined in her horse and came up to where Finn stood,
moon-struck and silent. “I’ve travelled a great distance to find you,” she said,
and Finn found his voice.
“Who are you and where have you come from?” he asked. “Tell us
your name and the name of your kingdom.”
“I am called Niamh of the Golden Hair and my father is the king of Tir
na n-Og, the Land of Youth,” the girl replied.
Accounts of Fionn’s death vary, but in folk tradition he is still alive (sleeping in
a cave), ready to help Ireland in times of need.
The cycle has been Christianized, and some stories present the meeting of
Oísin and other survivors of the Fianna with St. Patrick, the warriors
lamenting the abeyance of heroic conduct in Christian Ireland.
Ossianism had a massive cultural impact during the 18th and 19th centuries.
Napoleon carried a copy into battle; Goethe translated parts of it, and one of
Ingres' most romantic and moody paintings, the Dream of Ossian was based
on it.
FINNEGAN’S WAKE
It further relates to Fionn mac Cumhaill who, having passed away (‘Macool,
Macool, orra whyi deed ye diie?’), will inevitably return (‘Mister Finn, you’re
going to be Mister Finnagain!’
Its structure is governed by Giambattista Vico’s division of human history into
three ages (divine, heroic, and human), to which Joyce added a section
called the ‘Ricorso’, emphasizing the Neapolitan philosopher’s cyclical
conception.
It also systematically reflects Giordano Bruno’s theory that everything in
nature is realized through interaction with its opposite.
It also connects to modern psychology, the novel enacting the processes of
the sleeping mind in keeping with Joyce’s description of it as the dream of
Fionn lying in death beside the Liffey.
The main characters of the novel are:
• Humphrey Chimpden Earwicker (HCE) (Father)
• Ana Livia Plurabelle (ALP) (Mother)
• Shem the Penman and Shaun the Post (Sons)
riverrun, past Eve and Adam’s, from swerve of shore to bend of bay,
brings us by a commodius vicus of recirculation back to Howth Castle and
Environs.
Sir Tristram, violer d’amores, fr’over the short sea, had passencore
rearrived from North Armorica on this side the scraggy isthmus of Europe
minor to wielderfight his penisolate war, nor had topsawyer’s rocks by the
stream Oconee exaggerated themselse to Laurens Country’s gorgios while
they went doublin their mumper all the time, nor avoice from afire bellowsed
mishe mishe to tauf-tauf thuartpeatrick, not yet, though vennissoon after, had
a kidscad buttened a bland old isaac, not yet, though all’s fair in vanessy,
were sosie sesters wroth with thone nathandjoe. Not a peck of pa’s malt had
Jhem or Shen brewed by archlight and rory end to the regginbrow was to be
seen ringsome on the aquaface.
The fall
(bababadalgharagharaghtakmminorronnkonnbronntonnerronn-
tuonnthunntrovarrhhounawskawntoohoohoordenenthurnuk!) of a once
wallstrait oldparr is related early in bed and later on life down through all
christian minstrelsy. The great fall of the offwall entailed at such short notice
the pftjschute of Finnegan, erse solid man, that the humptyhillhead of himself
prumptly sends an unquiring one well to the west quest of his tumptytumtoes:
and their upturnpikepoindandplace is at the knock out in the park where
oranges have been laid to rust upon the green since devlinsfirst loved livvy.
[. . .]
A way a lone a last a loved a long the
Task
Consider one of the following topics to develop into a full-length essay:
BUILE SUIBHNE
[THE MADNESS/FRENZY OF SWEENEY]
Suibhne son of Colman was king of Dal nAraide. One day St. Ronan was
marking the boundaries of a church in that country, and Suibhne heard the
sound of his bell. Then his people told him that the saint was establishing a
church in his territory, he set out in anger to expel the cleric. His wife Eorann
sought to restrain him and caught the border of his cloak, but he rushed
naked from the house, leaving the cloak in her hands. Ronan was chanting
the Office when Suibhne came up, and the king seized the psalter and threw
it into the lake. He then laid hands on the saint and was dragging him away,
when a messenger arrived from Congal Claen to summon him to the battle of
Moira. Suibhne departed with the messenger, leaving Ronan sorrowful. Next
day an otter from the lake restored the psalter to the saint unharmed. Ronan
gave thanks to God and cursed the king, wishing that he might wander naked
through the world as he had come naked into his presence.
Ronan went to Moira to make peace between Domnall and Congal
Claen, but without success. He and his clerics sprinkled holy water on the
armies, but when they sprinkled in on Suibhne, he slew one of the clerics
with a spear and made a second cast at Ronan himself. The second spear
broke against the saint’s bell, and the shaft flew into the air. Ronan cursed
Suibhne, wishing that he might fly through the air like the shaft of his spear
and that he might die of a spar cast like the cleric whom he had slain.
Thereafter, when the battle was joined, the armies on both sides raised
three mighty shouts. Suibhne was terrified by the clamour. His weapons fell
from his hands. He was seized with trembling and fled in a frenzy like a bird
of the air. His feet rarely touched the ground in his flight, and at last he
The man by the wall snores: I dare not sleep like that. For seven years since
that Tuesday at Moira I have not slept for a moment. [. . .]
The cress of the well of Druim Cirb is my meal at terce. My face betrays it.
Truly I am Suibhne the Madman. [. . .]
Though I live from hill to hill on the mountain above the valley of yews, alas!
That I was not left to lie with Congal Claen. [. . .]
Green cress and a drink of clear water is my fare. I do not smile. This is not
the fate of the man by the wall. [. . .]
[. . .]At last Suibhne came to the monastery of St. Mo ling. Mo Ling made him
welcome and bade him return from his wanderings every evening so that his
history might be written, for it was destined that his story should be written
there and that he should receive a Christian burial. Mo Ling bade his cook
give supper to Suibhne, and, wherever he travelled during the day, he would
return at night. The cook would thrust her foot into some cowdung and fill the
hole with milk, and Suibhne would lie down to drink. But the cook’s husband,
who was a herdsman, grew jealous of this attention by his wife, and he slew
Suibhne with a spear as he lay drinking the milk one evening. Before his
death he confessed his sins and received the body of Christ and was
anointed. [The conversation of Suibhne, Mo Ling and Mongan the herdsman
is recorded in a poem of twenty-six quatrains, in which Suibhne says:
Sweeter to me once that the sound of a bell beside me was the song of a
blackbird on the mountain and the belling of the stag in a storm.
Sweeter to me once than the voice of a lovely woman beside me was the
voice of the mountain grouse at dawn.
Sweeter to me once was the cry of wolves than the voice of a cleric within
bleating and whining.
Though you like to drink your ale in taverns with honour, I would rather drink
water from my hand taken from the well by stealth.
Though sweet to you yonder in the church the smooth words of your
students, sweeter to me the noble chant of the hounds of Glenn Bolcain.]
Here is the tomb of Suibhne. His memory grieves my heart. Dear to me for
the love of him is every place the holy madman frequented. [. . .]
Dear to me each cool stream on which the green cress grew, dear each well
of clear water, for Suibhne used to visit them.
If the King of the stars allows it, arise and go with me. Give me, O heart, thy
hand, and come from the tomb.
Sweet to me was the conversation of Suibhne: long shall I remember it. I
pray to the chaste King of heaven over his grave and tomb.
Suibhne arose out of his swoon, and Mo Ling took him by the hand, and
they went together to the door of the church. And Suibhne leaned against the
doorpost and gave a great sigh, and his spirit went to heaven, and he was
buried with honour by Mo Ling.
“In nature poetry the Gaelic muse may vie with that of any other nation.
Indeed, these poems occupy a unique position in the literature of the world.
To seek out and watch and love Nature, in its tiniest phenomena as in its
grandest, was given to no people so early and so fully as to the Celt. Many
hundreds of Gaelic and Welsh poems testify to this fact. It is a characteristic
of these poems that in none of them do we get an elaborate or sustained
description of any scene or scenery, but rather a succession of pictures and
images which the poet, like an impressionist, calls up before us by light and
skilful touches. Like the Japanese, the Celts were always quick to take an
artistic hint; they avoid the obvious and the commonplace; the half-said thing
to them is dearest. “
Nature of explanation offered: It was stated that while the novel and
the play were both pleasing intellectual exercises, the novel was inferior to
the play inasmuch as it lacked the outward accidents of illusion, frequently
inducing the reader to be outwitted in a shabby fashion and caused to
experience a real concern for the fortunes of illusory characters. The play
was consumed in wholesome fashion by large masses in places of public
resort; the novel was self-administered in private. The novel, in the hands of
un unscrupulous writer, could be despotic. In reply to an inquiry, it was
explained that a satisfactory novel should be a self-evident sham to which the
reader could regulate at will the degree of his credulity. It was undemocratic
to compel characters to be uniformly good or bad or poor or rich. Each
should be allowed a private life, self-determination and a decent standard of
The Celtic Paradigm in Modern Irish Writing 51
Chapter 5 – The King (Historical) Cycle of Tales
living. This would make for self-respect, contentment and better service. It
would be incorrect to say that it would lead to chaos. Characters should be
interchangeable as between one book and another. The entire corpus of
existing literature should be regarded as a limbo from which discerning
authors could draw their characters as required, creating only when they
failed to find a suitable existing puppet. The modern novel should be largely a
work of reference. Most authors spend their time saying what has been said
before - usually said much better. A wealth of references to existing works
would acquaint the reader instantaneously with the nature of each character,
would obviate tiresome explanations and would effectively preclude
mountebanks, upstarts, thimbleriggers and persons of inferior education from
understanding contemporary literature. Conclusion of explanation.
That is all my bum, said Brinsley.
But taking precise typescript from beneath the book that was at my
side, I explained to him my literary intentions in considerable detail - now
reading, now discoursing, oratio recta and oratio obliqua. [direct speech and
indirect speech]
[. . . ]
After a prolonged travel and a searching in the skies, Sweeny arrived at
nightfall at the shore of the widespread Loch Ree his resting-place being the
fork of the tree of Tiobradan for that night. It snowed on his tree that night,
the snow being the worst of all the other snows he had endured since the
feather grew on his body, and he was constrained to the recital of these
following verses.
If the evil hag had not invoked Christ against me that I should perform leaps
for her amusement, I would not have relapsed into madness, said Sweeny.
Come here, said Lamont, what’s this about jumps?
Hopping around, you know, said Furriskey.
The story, said learned Shanahan in a learned explanatory manner, is
about this fellow Sweeny that argued the toss with the clergy and came off
second-best at the wind-up. There was a curse - a malediction - put down in
the book against him. The upshot is that your man becomes a bloody bird.
I see, said Lamont.
Heaney's work is often set in rural Londonderry, the county of his childhood.
Hints of sectarian violence can be found in many of his poems, even works
that on the surface appear to deal with something else. Like the Troubles
themselves, Heaney's work is deeply associated with the lessons of history,
sometimes even prehistory.
Under the influence of P.V. Glob’s “The Bog People” – which dealt with the
discovery of well-preserved Iron Age bodies in the Danish bogs, many of
which seemed to have been ritually sacrificed to earth deities, Heaney
evolved the “bog myth” to distance the sectarian killings in modern Ulster
through their analogues of 2000 years ago.
In “Punishment”, for example, the body of a young Danish woman accused
of adultery and sacrificed to the land in an ancient fertility ritual prompts him
meditate on tribal revenge and justice, finding its modern counterpart in the
shaved and tarred heads of young Irish women humiliated by the I.R.A. for
fraternizing with British soldiers.
to store
the memories of love.
Little adulteress,
before they punish you
EXPOSURE
It is December in Wicklow:
Alders dripping, birches
Inheriting the last light,
The ash tree cold to look at.
Imagining a hero
On some muddy compound,
His gift like a slingstone
Whirled for the desperate.
SWEENEY ASTRAY
In 1995 Seamus Heaney was awarded the Nobel Prize for literature.
Task
Consider one of the following topics to develop into a full-length critical
essay:
Minimal Bibliography: