I wanted to enjoy this one more than I did. 18 short stories from what the Irish Folklore Commission called "one of the greatest woman storytellers of recent times" - but often the stories lack any real merit. How the Fish was stolen from Old Kate and how Herself ate some of it for example. "On my soul, isn't it harder to steal her temple from the wasp than sneak up on Old Kate to take any fish from her" - but as it happens, Old Kate falls asleep watching the fish, and the protagonist crawls through a bush to steal three fish. And then invites Old Kate around to dinner to tell her she's feeding her stolen fish, whereupon they all have a good laugh and we move on to the next story. It's not riveting stuff.
These stories were all dictated by Peig in the 30s (there's suggestions some of them have been edited by the transcribers) and there is some interest in hearing stories dictated that late where characters have to ask others to translate from English so they can understand, or a reference to a souper's grave (which caused a saintly visitation to stop). But mostly it's about fishing or a wake or emigration (the visit of a Mexican who speaks fluent Irish from his grandparents, or the return of a man from Buenos Aires, who landed there after his boat to Canada sank, and after four days afloat in a life raft he ended up in South America somehow) or just love stories with general bitchiness thrown in. Yet they usually sound more interesting than they are.
While most of the stories are local history - fishing accidents feature a lot - the last two are larger social history, the first on news of the 1916 Rising and the second on Peig getting in a car for the first time to apply for the new "pension" which had just been introduced. Yet even these fall flat in the telling. In the latter, Peig gets in the car, the driver stops off in a pub for a couple of drinks while Peig applies for the pension, they drive back to the pier to get back to the Blaskets, and then the pension never comes through. And the former - "a big wonderful story" starts with the postman bringing the news that "Dublin City was one huge fire and the big guns of the Stranger battering it and the fragrant blood of the Irish being spilled" - is met with equal parts excitement and anxiety. "The Irish are awake again, and the people are stirred as never I saw them [...] But it will be paid for dearly, because great as our hate for England is, great and wonderful is the strength she has. We heard that the sun never sets on her lands." There's a question of whether the English will come to the Blaskets - why on earth should they, says one, while another points out that an isolated island would be a great place for storing arms. The English do come - Peig's husband entreats her to take down the pictures of the 1916 leaders from the walls in case the English shoot them, but Peig refuses, the English visit, there's a brief chat in which neither side can understand the other's language, and the English head on again, and "soon after that, peace came and the terror that was upon the people went", the end.