Ó Ríordáin, Seán Pádraig.

Eireaball Spideoige.

The very rare first edition of the poets first book ! Baile Átha Cliath, Sáirséa agus Dill [Sáirséal Ó Marcaigh], 1952. Small Octavo. 118, [2] pages – [With a frontispiece portrait]. Original Hardcover with the fragile, original, transparent dustjacket (the lettered flaps have been attached to the pastedowns with two small strips of sellotape). The transparent dustjacket in poor condition but the volume itself in very good condition with only minor signs of external wear. Three very small dogears. Name of preowner on endpaper. The first edition of this publication is one of the rarest publications of irish poetry / literature. Scarce ! From the library of irish Historian Tadhg Ó Murchú, with his name on the endpaper.

Seán Pádraig Ó Ríordáin (3 December 1916 – 21 February 1977) was one of the most important Irish language poets of the twentieth century and arguably the most significant figure in introducing European themes into traditional Irish poetry.
He was born in Baile Mhúirne, County Cork, the eldest of three children of Seán Ó Ríordáin of Baile Mhúirne and Mairéad Ní Loineacháin of Cúil Ealta.
English was his first language. His mother spoke English; his father spoke Irish and English. His father’s mother, a native Irish speaker, lived next door. His next-door neighbour on the other side also spoke Irish. It wasn’t long before Ó Ríordáin gained some knowledge of Irish.
Seán was only ten when his father died of tuberculosis. Five years later, the family moved to Inniscarra, on the outskirts of Cork city. After settling there, Seán and his brother Tadhg were sent to school in the North Monastery Christian Brothers School, on Cork’s northside. When he was a young man he was diagnosed with tuberculosis. He lived to the age of sixty and was constantly in poor health. Ó Ríordáin published four books: Eireaball Spideoige [A Robin’s Tail] (Sáirséal Ó Marcaigh 1952), a volume of some hundred pages, and three subsequent booklets, Brosna [Kindling] (Sáirséal agus Dill 1964), Línte Liombó [Limbo Lines] (Sáirséal agus Dill 1971), and the posthumous Tar éis mo Bháis [After my Death] (Sáirséal agus Dill, 1978).

The title of his first collection is borrowed from the first line of the final verse of Ó Ríordáin’s more celebrated poem. A new frisson was created in Irish language poetry when this poem, Adhlacadh Mo Mháthar (My Mother’s Burial), was first published in 1945. It celebrates the innocence, devoutness, and motherliness of the poet’s dead mother.
Ó Ríordáin delineates his personal aesthetic and theology in the preface to his first collection of poetry, Eireaball Spideoige (A Robin’s Tail) (1952), in which he highlights the relationship between artistic expression, poetry in particular, and being. He argues that poetry is to be under the aspect of another and without that relationship one can only ever produce a prosaic narrative. In that same preface, Ó Ríordáin considers an appropriation of an infant’s mind as a prerequisite for the poetic act. The poem An Peaca (The Sin) reveals that Ó Ríordáin’s ability to write poetry is at once lost if his immediate relation to nature is interrupted.

Ó Ríordáin has been described as a European poet. The clash between traditional Irish and contemporary European influences was one of the most consistent conflicts in his work. As with all ‘modernisers’ of tradition, Ó Ríordáin received considerable opprobrium from traditionalists, most notably Máire Mhac an tSaoi. These attacks, particularly by Mhac an tSaoi on the standard of his Irish, did considerable damage to Seán’s confidence and added to his already ill health. He never forgave Mhac an tSaoi. In a 1970 ‘Writer in Profile’ television interview with Ó Ríordáin, Mhac an tSaoi phoned the station to say that she ‘had never heard better Irish spoken than that by Seán Ó Ríordáin tonight’. Ó Ríordáin’s response, as recorded by his biographer Seán Ó Coileáin: ‘my bowels moved in disdain’. (Wikipedia)

• Keywords: Catalogue Irish History Four – Irish Postwar History & Administration · Catalogue Irish History Seven – Irish Literature – Poetry – Music – Theatre · Catalogue Irish History Six – General Irish History · Collection Tadhg Ó Murchú (This is a book from his personal reference library) · First Book · First Edition · From the library of Tadgh Ó Murchu · Gaeilge · Gaeilge – Rare · Gaelic · Gaelic Language · Gaelic Poetry · Irish History · Irish Literature – Rare · Irish Poetry – Rare · Poetry – Rare
• Language: Gaeilge
• Inventory Number: 101315AB

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