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On an Irish Island
On an Irish Island is a love letter to a vanished way of life, in which Robert Kanigel, the highly praised author of The Man Who Knew Infinity and The One Best Way, tells the story of the Great Blasket, a wildly beautiful island off the west coast of Ireland, renowned during the early twentieth century for the rich communal life of its residents and the unadulterated Irish they spoke. With the Irish language vanishing all through the rest of Ireland, the Great Blasket became a magnet for scholars and writers drawn there during the Gaelic renaissance—and the scene for a memorable clash of cultures between modern life and an older, sometimes sweeter world slipping away.
Kanigel introduces us to the playwright John Millington Synge, some of whose characters in The Playboy of the Western World, were inspired by his time on the island; Carl Marstrander, a Norwegian linguist who gave his place on Norway’s Olympic team for a summer on the Blasket; Marie-Louise Sjoestedt, a Celtic studies scholar fresh from the Sorbonne; and central to the story, George Thomson, a British classicist whose involvement with the island and its people we follow from his first visit as a twenty-year-old to the end of his life.
On the island, they met a colorful coterie of men and women with whom they formed lifelong and life-changing friendships. There’s Tomás O’Crohan, a stoic fisherman, one of the few islanders who could read and write Irish, who tutored many of the incomers in the language’s formidable intricacies and became the Blasket’s first published writer; Maurice O’Sullivan, a good-natured prankster and teller of stories, whose memoir, Twenty Years A-Growing, became an Irish classic; and Peig Sayers, whose endless repertoire of earthy tales left listeners spellbound.
As we get to know these men and women, we become immersed in the vivid culture of the islanders, their hard lives of fishing and farming matched by their love of singing, dancing, and talk. Yet, sadly, we watch them leave the island, the village becoming uninhabited by 1953. The story of the Great Blasket is one of struggle—between the call of modernity and the tug of Ireland’s ancient ways, between the promise of emigration and the peculiar warmth of island life amid its physical isolation. But ultimately it is a tribute to the strength and beauty of a people who, tucked away from the rest of civilization, kept alive a nation’s past, and to the newcomers and islanders alike who brought the island’s remarkable story to the larger world.
Kanigel introduces us to the playwright John Millington Synge, some of whose characters in The Playboy of the Western World, were inspired by his time on the island; Carl Marstrander, a Norwegian linguist who gave his place on Norway’s Olympic team for a summer on the Blasket; Marie-Louise Sjoestedt, a Celtic studies scholar fresh from the Sorbonne; and central to the story, George Thomson, a British classicist whose involvement with the island and its people we follow from his first visit as a twenty-year-old to the end of his life.
On the island, they met a colorful coterie of men and women with whom they formed lifelong and life-changing friendships. There’s Tomás O’Crohan, a stoic fisherman, one of the few islanders who could read and write Irish, who tutored many of the incomers in the language’s formidable intricacies and became the Blasket’s first published writer; Maurice O’Sullivan, a good-natured prankster and teller of stories, whose memoir, Twenty Years A-Growing, became an Irish classic; and Peig Sayers, whose endless repertoire of earthy tales left listeners spellbound.
As we get to know these men and women, we become immersed in the vivid culture of the islanders, their hard lives of fishing and farming matched by their love of singing, dancing, and talk. Yet, sadly, we watch them leave the island, the village becoming uninhabited by 1953. The story of the Great Blasket is one of struggle—between the call of modernity and the tug of Ireland’s ancient ways, between the promise of emigration and the peculiar warmth of island life amid its physical isolation. But ultimately it is a tribute to the strength and beauty of a people who, tucked away from the rest of civilization, kept alive a nation’s past, and to the newcomers and islanders alike who brought the island’s remarkable story to the larger world.
338 pages, Kindle Edition
First published February 7, 2012
205 people are currently reading
760 people want to read
About the author
Robert Kanigel
21 books135 followersRobert Kanigel was born in Brooklyn, but for most of his adult life has lived in Baltimore. He has written nine books.
"The Man Who Knew Infinity," his second book, was named a National Book Critics Circle finalist, a Los Angeles Times Book Prize finalist, and a New York Public Library "Book to Remember." It has been translated into Italian, German, Polish, Greek, Chinese, Thai, and many other languages, and has been made into a feature film, starring Jeremy Irons and Dev Patel, which premiered at the Toronto International Film Festival in 2015.
Kanigel's 2012 book, "On an Irish Island," set on a windswept island village off the coast of Ireland, was nurtured by a Guggenheim fellowship and later awarded the Michael J. Durkan Prize by the American Conference for Irish Studies.
"Eyes on the Street," his biography of Jane Jacobs, the far-seeing author of "The Death and Life of Great American Cities" and fearless champion of big-city life, was published by Knopf in 2016.
His most recent book, "Hearing Homer's Song: The Brief Life and Big Idea of Milman Parry," is a biography of the man who revolutionized our understanding of the Homeric epics. In support of this project Kanigel was awarded an NEH Public Scholar award.
"The Man Who Knew Infinity," his second book, was named a National Book Critics Circle finalist, a Los Angeles Times Book Prize finalist, and a New York Public Library "Book to Remember." It has been translated into Italian, German, Polish, Greek, Chinese, Thai, and many other languages, and has been made into a feature film, starring Jeremy Irons and Dev Patel, which premiered at the Toronto International Film Festival in 2015.
Kanigel's 2012 book, "On an Irish Island," set on a windswept island village off the coast of Ireland, was nurtured by a Guggenheim fellowship and later awarded the Michael J. Durkan Prize by the American Conference for Irish Studies.
"Eyes on the Street," his biography of Jane Jacobs, the far-seeing author of "The Death and Life of Great American Cities" and fearless champion of big-city life, was published by Knopf in 2016.
His most recent book, "Hearing Homer's Song: The Brief Life and Big Idea of Milman Parry," is a biography of the man who revolutionized our understanding of the Homeric epics. In support of this project Kanigel was awarded an NEH Public Scholar award.
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Displaying 1 - 30 of 42 reviews
May 14, 2012
This was an amazing book. Kanigel has woven the history of the rise of 20th century writing in Irish, and the Great Blasket Island. I discovered that there were a number of outsiders aside from Robin Flowers, whose name I knew, who helped launch the literary movement on the island. A number of islanders wrote works in the Irish language starting with The IslandmanTomas O'Crohan. I didn't know that Irish speakers at the turn of the 20th century were not literate in Irish, though this makes sense historically. The British imposed English language education on the Irish in the 19th century. The final chapter of his book is probably my favorite part of the book as Kanigel reflects on the modern world, the desire of many of us to temporarily escape to places that are closer to tradition, and away from the demands and materialism of the developed world.
October 28, 2020
A stunning piece of nonfiction embodied by a sense of melancholy and loss, much appropriate for a story so intrinsically Irish. A century ago, scholars began to visit the isle of Great Blasket just off Ireland's west coast. Much of Ireland no longer spoke Irish, thanks to the heavy hand of English dominion, and isolated Great Blasket was one of the few places where the old language and stories were still known and available for study.
This book isn't simply about these scholars acting as 'noble saviors' for the peasantry. These men and women were deeply changed by their experiences on the island, yes, but even more they didn't simply take from the island citizens, but gave them a chance for their voices to be heard, literally. This was an early, unusual instance of an #OwnVoices movement encouraged by ardent allies. Storytellers on Great Blasket published books on their lives, to great international acclaim. More scholars and tourists came. This attention was not enough to save the island, though. Since earlier in the 19th century, its residents (young women in particular) had departed for America or the Irish mainland. Really, these visiting scholars came in time to help the citizens preserve what was known of the 'old ways' before the island itself was fully vacated.
This is a fast, fascinating read. I came to really care about these people. This books provides incredible insights into a pivotal time in Irish history, and into a place that sounds stunning in its beauty and isolation. In this year when travel is near impossible, this was the type of read that felt like it moved me in time and place for a brief while.
This book isn't simply about these scholars acting as 'noble saviors' for the peasantry. These men and women were deeply changed by their experiences on the island, yes, but even more they didn't simply take from the island citizens, but gave them a chance for their voices to be heard, literally. This was an early, unusual instance of an #OwnVoices movement encouraged by ardent allies. Storytellers on Great Blasket published books on their lives, to great international acclaim. More scholars and tourists came. This attention was not enough to save the island, though. Since earlier in the 19th century, its residents (young women in particular) had departed for America or the Irish mainland. Really, these visiting scholars came in time to help the citizens preserve what was known of the 'old ways' before the island itself was fully vacated.
This is a fast, fascinating read. I came to really care about these people. This books provides incredible insights into a pivotal time in Irish history, and into a place that sounds stunning in its beauty and isolation. In this year when travel is near impossible, this was the type of read that felt like it moved me in time and place for a brief while.
April 26, 2012
A wonderful book about the people of the Great Basket during the first half of ,the 20th century, both the islanders and those few men and women who went to study the language and became part of the story. The hard lives of the island folk, their love of singing and dance, and story-telling contrast with the lives of the scholars who spend brief weeks with them, but are deeply moved and influenced by those times. It's the story of change and courage, and a tribute to the people who brought the island's story to the world. I was fortunate enough to visit this part of Ireland, stand on the shore and look out at the Great Blasket; it was hard to imagine the lives of the people there. This book brings the island and the people to life.
January 18, 2013
This is a moderately interesting book about life on the idyllic Great Blasket Island, off the coast of Ireland. Set during the early Twentieth Century, the isolated spot was the site of a purer Irish culture before the onset of literacy, technology and emigration, eradicated the 18th century based customs, values, and communality.
The book is somewhat academic for most tastes, unless one is a student of Irish literature or of Irish history. Much of it concerns the incredible literary output of the Island, once it had been visited by Irish language specialists. The linguists were spurred by the Irish independence movement and by the recognition that the Anglicizing of Ireland was resulting in the erosion of the Irish language (Gaelic), as well as of the soul of its people, who were rooted in the folkways and traditions of the language. At the end of the nineteenth century, the Great Blasket was still an oral society and language was still in an uncontaminated state.
The islanders were a remnant of a group which had gone there in the 18th century. They were the families of fishermen, hardy, happy, and eloquent in their use of language. Their lives were totally without modern conveniences. They lived in cottages of stone, with earthen floors and thatched roofs, heated by turf (peat) fires, which they dug from the earth. The animals: sheep, cows, chickens, donkeys, lived inside when the weather necessitated. Their evenings were filled with singing, dancing, and telling of tales before the great fireplace. The two musical instruments the pipes, and the melodeon, were known to almost every island youngster. Their lives were arduous, but harmonious. It was much more communal in nature than is seen in the modern world.
The island was "discovered" by noted Irish playwright, J. M. Synge, who was the first of several well-known literary figures who became enamored by its stark primeval beauty, as well as by the friendliness and warmth of its people. These included George Thomson, a British classicist; Carl Marstrander, a Norwegian linguist, Marie-Louise Sjoestedt, a scholar of Celtic studies from the Sorbonne, and Robin Flower, of the British Museum. Most of these came first to study the language, but returned again and again, and made lasting relationships with the islanders.
The introduction of literacy brought a flowering of the written word with the production of several books which helped form the foundation for Irish literary studies. The last of the islanders were moved to the mainland in the early 1940's, bringing to a close the last, best, center for the study of rural Irish culture.
The book is somewhat academic for most tastes, unless one is a student of Irish literature or of Irish history. Much of it concerns the incredible literary output of the Island, once it had been visited by Irish language specialists. The linguists were spurred by the Irish independence movement and by the recognition that the Anglicizing of Ireland was resulting in the erosion of the Irish language (Gaelic), as well as of the soul of its people, who were rooted in the folkways and traditions of the language. At the end of the nineteenth century, the Great Blasket was still an oral society and language was still in an uncontaminated state.
The islanders were a remnant of a group which had gone there in the 18th century. They were the families of fishermen, hardy, happy, and eloquent in their use of language. Their lives were totally without modern conveniences. They lived in cottages of stone, with earthen floors and thatched roofs, heated by turf (peat) fires, which they dug from the earth. The animals: sheep, cows, chickens, donkeys, lived inside when the weather necessitated. Their evenings were filled with singing, dancing, and telling of tales before the great fireplace. The two musical instruments the pipes, and the melodeon, were known to almost every island youngster. Their lives were arduous, but harmonious. It was much more communal in nature than is seen in the modern world.
The island was "discovered" by noted Irish playwright, J. M. Synge, who was the first of several well-known literary figures who became enamored by its stark primeval beauty, as well as by the friendliness and warmth of its people. These included George Thomson, a British classicist; Carl Marstrander, a Norwegian linguist, Marie-Louise Sjoestedt, a scholar of Celtic studies from the Sorbonne, and Robin Flower, of the British Museum. Most of these came first to study the language, but returned again and again, and made lasting relationships with the islanders.
The introduction of literacy brought a flowering of the written word with the production of several books which helped form the foundation for Irish literary studies. The last of the islanders were moved to the mainland in the early 1940's, bringing to a close the last, best, center for the study of rural Irish culture.
May 1, 2025
This book tells the story of life on Great Blasket Island, off the west coast of Ireland, during the first 50 years of the 20th Century. Great Blasket was one of the last places where the Irish language was spoken by all residents. The people in this remote community made their living by fishing and subsistence farming. There was no electricity or indoor plumbing.
Because of their remote location and lack of modern entertainments, the island residents developed a rich culture and a tight community. Former residents recall fondly the many get-togethers, usually involving singing, music and dancing, that they enjoyed before the island was abandoned in 1953. They maintained a strong faith, in spite of the fact that a priest from the mainland was able to visit only once a year.
Because of their remote location and lack of modern entertainments, the island residents developed a rich culture and a tight community. Former residents recall fondly the many get-togethers, usually involving singing, music and dancing, that they enjoyed before the island was abandoned in 1953. They maintained a strong faith, in spite of the fact that a priest from the mainland was able to visit only once a year.
February 21, 2012
I read "The Islandman" years ago when living in Ireland after visiting Slea Head on the Dingle peninsula and seeing the Blaskets across the sound; it's intriguing to imagine the tiny community on that desolate island, abandoned only in relatively recent times. The imagery of place and times conveyed by Tomas O Criomhthain is wonderous enough, but the language is what makes the book so marvelous. It has a luminosity and lyricism -- through Flower's superb translation from the Irish -- that is spellbinding. It must mirror the Irish for it has a rhythm and meter that is quite unlike English. The book conveys such close sense of the people and their lives in this remote place. "Island Cross-Talk", "Twenty Years a-Growing" and "Peig" should be read also as they likewise convey the rich texture of the Blaskets.
Kanigel's book gives the story behind the genesis of this literature. He tells of the scholars (from Ireland, England, France and Norway) who spent time on the island, learning the (very difficult) language and absorbing the culture and ways of the islanders. The emerging commitment across Ireland in the early 20th century to preserve the language brought this attention to the Blaskets where perhaps the purest form of Irish was still in use, not yet overrun by English. What the scholars achieved through their relationships with O Criomhthain, O'Sullivan and Sayers was to encourage and facilitate the transition of the island's oral expression to written form. This was done through developing close relationships and deep friendships with the islanders that carried on for decades. You get the impression that this was much more than intellectual, scholarly work for these linguists; there was a loving regard for the people and deeply sincere respect for the island ways.
Kanigel follows the lives of the islanders and scholars on and off the island and this gives satisfying insights into the worlds of both.
If you haven't already read the Blasket literature, you will want to do so, preferably (at least one of the books) before Kanigel's book.
Kanigel's book gives the story behind the genesis of this literature. He tells of the scholars (from Ireland, England, France and Norway) who spent time on the island, learning the (very difficult) language and absorbing the culture and ways of the islanders. The emerging commitment across Ireland in the early 20th century to preserve the language brought this attention to the Blaskets where perhaps the purest form of Irish was still in use, not yet overrun by English. What the scholars achieved through their relationships with O Criomhthain, O'Sullivan and Sayers was to encourage and facilitate the transition of the island's oral expression to written form. This was done through developing close relationships and deep friendships with the islanders that carried on for decades. You get the impression that this was much more than intellectual, scholarly work for these linguists; there was a loving regard for the people and deeply sincere respect for the island ways.
Kanigel follows the lives of the islanders and scholars on and off the island and this gives satisfying insights into the worlds of both.
If you haven't already read the Blasket literature, you will want to do so, preferably (at least one of the books) before Kanigel's book.
August 28, 2015
I read it because some literati reviews somewhere praised it. Actually, midway through I skipped to the final two chapters. What a slog! I can't imagine anybody other than a relative of a Blasket Islander caring about this material. Although there seemed to be much research by the author, he gets into trivia that seemed almost pointless. I felt afterwards that I had learned little about the lives of the islanders. Maybe I learned a little more about the distinguished visitors who stayed there to learn Irish; but not enough to really care. Not sure what the point of this book was. Sadness, I suppose about a way of life now gone. But, as I said, precious little discussion about the particulars of that way of life. Some small revelation that although the islanders were poor and somewhat isolated, they were not unhappy, nor were they primitive. Okay; so what?
February 22, 2021
It’s difficult not to find this story interesting even 70 some years after Great Blasket was abandoned.
The focus of Kanigel’s book is on the early 20th century researchers and linguists who visited and were charmed by the “pure” Gaelic language spoken by the 150 souls on the isolated island. Enduring friendships were made and some talented islanders were encouraged to write books in Gaelic that have remained popular to this day. Without those researchers the islanders would have slipped off to other parts of Ireland, to England and to America without notice. A melancholy thought.
The focus of Kanigel’s book is on the early 20th century researchers and linguists who visited and were charmed by the “pure” Gaelic language spoken by the 150 souls on the isolated island. Enduring friendships were made and some talented islanders were encouraged to write books in Gaelic that have remained popular to this day. Without those researchers the islanders would have slipped off to other parts of Ireland, to England and to America without notice. A melancholy thought.
May 21, 2012
The story of educated English and Irish authors immersing themselves in the isolated, Gaelic-speaking culture of the Blasket Islands circa 1900 - 1930. Occasionally a little hard to follow as the author moves from one writer to another - but always absorbing and well-written. The best account I know of the now-vanished Blasket culture.
January 23, 2015
We want stories of isolated life to be mysterious and uplifting. This story was sometimes enticing, sometimes plodding. It's the sort of book to read only if you have a compelling interest in the topic.
December 20, 2019
Not what I thought it would be. Didn’t finish it.
July 3, 2023
I ran across this during a library browse, and thought it would be good to get me anticipating my trip to Ireland in the fall (I've been out to the Blasket and plan to go again). I did consider, though, What is left to say about the Blaskets? The people who lived there have told their own stories, and the major people who visited have written their own books.
The answer was, to talk about the people who visited and helped steer the Blasket writers to publication. It was interesting to learn more about George Thomson, Robin Flower, and Brian Kelly, as well as some others who studied the island that I'd never heard of.
The last chapter, which meditates upon what these people found in the island, and how realistic was their view of life there, was particularly thoughtful.
Having said that - a couple of things did bug me.
Why English these people's names? They became well known by their Irish names and published their books under those names, and they knew themselves by their Irish names. Why turn Muiris O Suilleabhain into Maurice?
Then there were a few clear errors in the Irish, which would have been found in another once-over by someone with Irish (the author does not know Irish). Just because the word for storyteller has sean in it does not mean it has seán in it - Seán is a name, sean means old - it's seanchaí not seánchaí. Cleaning this up would have helped with general credibility. And the RTE documentary about the island, which I have a copy of, is called Oileán Eile and I doubt anyone has ever called it just Another Island so I found that a bit silly. Which reminds me, I have to go watch that again.
The answer was, to talk about the people who visited and helped steer the Blasket writers to publication. It was interesting to learn more about George Thomson, Robin Flower, and Brian Kelly, as well as some others who studied the island that I'd never heard of.
The last chapter, which meditates upon what these people found in the island, and how realistic was their view of life there, was particularly thoughtful.
Having said that - a couple of things did bug me.
Why English these people's names? They became well known by their Irish names and published their books under those names, and they knew themselves by their Irish names. Why turn Muiris O Suilleabhain into Maurice?
Then there were a few clear errors in the Irish, which would have been found in another once-over by someone with Irish (the author does not know Irish). Just because the word for storyteller has sean in it does not mean it has seán in it - Seán is a name, sean means old - it's seanchaí not seánchaí. Cleaning this up would have helped with general credibility. And the RTE documentary about the island, which I have a copy of, is called Oileán Eile and I doubt anyone has ever called it just Another Island so I found that a bit silly. Which reminds me, I have to go watch that again.
May 1, 2021
I remember when I first saw this book in my local book store, I was drawn to it for some inexplicable reason. I walked away originally.
Weeks later I couldn’t get this book out of my mind, so I marched back into the store and bought it.
At first I let it sit on my shelf for a while.
When I did eventually bring myself to read it, I became quickly entrapped and enthralled with every page. There was proper historical research undertaken by the author, with a decent bibliography.
I adore history, linguistics and anthropology and was delighted to get a dose of all three academic fields in this book. It’s a brilliant expose of academic research obtained by scholarly visitors to the Blaskett islands over the years. The content was accessible and easy to read.
I was moved by the loving exchanges of travel and culture that happened with each visitor, until the island became uninhabited by the 1950s.
It’s a brilliant book about Irish culture and the Gaelic renaissance. I would highly recommend for anyone interested in Irish history and the Gaelic language.
Weeks later I couldn’t get this book out of my mind, so I marched back into the store and bought it.
At first I let it sit on my shelf for a while.
When I did eventually bring myself to read it, I became quickly entrapped and enthralled with every page. There was proper historical research undertaken by the author, with a decent bibliography.
I adore history, linguistics and anthropology and was delighted to get a dose of all three academic fields in this book. It’s a brilliant expose of academic research obtained by scholarly visitors to the Blaskett islands over the years. The content was accessible and easy to read.
I was moved by the loving exchanges of travel and culture that happened with each visitor, until the island became uninhabited by the 1950s.
It’s a brilliant book about Irish culture and the Gaelic renaissance. I would highly recommend for anyone interested in Irish history and the Gaelic language.
April 22, 2023
"On an Irish Island" took me to the Blaskets off the cost of Ireland where I found myself in a place in time far removed frome the modern world. Amidst the hardships endured the people of the island managed to not only sustain themselves but to enjoy life. Here was a comunity whole heartedly embracing and sharing their tradtions, their faith, their dancing, their stories, and their ancient language as they welcomed those visitors who truly wanted to immerse themselves in this most authentic of Irish cultures. As time went on the Blaskets could not meet the needs of its remaining few inhabitants. What remains is the rushing sea, the wildlife, and the barren homes of those who moved on.
May 28, 2018
This book is both history and a literary tour of an island off the west coast of Ireland. the island is called the Great Blasket and besides being beautiful was an enclave that scholars went to in the early 1900's to study old Gaelic and to study the people who were isolated and adhered to an old way of life.
December 5, 2019
Fascinating history of the Irish Literary Revival on Great Blasket, an Island off the coast of Kerry. I especially enjoyed extensive quotes from the journals, letters, and books written by islanders, originally in Irish and how each came to be published.
January 21, 2024
I liked this biography of Great Blasket Island. I thought the Islanders and visitors that are described really create a wonderful sense of place and -- although it's Irish lit so you know it will be sad-- it has really beautiful moments of friendship and joy mixed into the sadness.
May 22, 2019
I fell in love with the people. Very interesting
December 27, 2019
The history especially during WWII was great, but, with so many characters it was hard to follow.
Read
July 11, 2020Enjoyed the history of this Island. It will make my visit very meaningful.
September 28, 2025
I found parts of this interesting but mostly it felt trivial.
July 31, 2012
This work is a unique combination of telling the story of a way of life that is gone, a language and word origin study, how writers are affected by location and people and the shared love and admiration for a particular set of islands, the Blaskets.
This story is set mainly of the Great Blasket, an island off the west coast of Ireland, known during the early twentieth century for the communal life of its residents and the unadulterated Irish they spoke. With the Irish language vanishing all through the rest of Ireland, the Great Blasket became a magnet for scholars and writers drawn there to study a language that is slipping away and discovered a whole culture that is slipping away.
Kanigel introduces us to the playwright John Millington Synge, some of whose characters in The Playboy of the Western World, were inspired by his time on the island; Carl Marstrander, a Norwegian linguist who gave his place on Norway’s Olympic team for a summer on the Blasket; Marie-Louise Sjoestedt, a Celtic studies scholar fresh from the Sorbonne; and central to the story, George Thomson, a British classicist whose involvement with the island and its people we follow from his first visit as a twenty-year-old to the end of his life.
On the island, they met men and women with whom they formed lifelong and life-changing friendships. This book lets us get to know these men and women and learn of the culture of the islanders, their hard lives of fishing and farming matched by their love of singing, dancing, and talk. Sadly, we watch them leave the island, the village becoming uninhabited by 1953. The story of the Great Blasket is one of struggle—between the promise of emigration and the peculiar warmth of island life amid its physical isolation. This is the Ireland I imagine when I picture my ancestors setting sail from Ireland to America.
This story is set mainly of the Great Blasket, an island off the west coast of Ireland, known during the early twentieth century for the communal life of its residents and the unadulterated Irish they spoke. With the Irish language vanishing all through the rest of Ireland, the Great Blasket became a magnet for scholars and writers drawn there to study a language that is slipping away and discovered a whole culture that is slipping away.
Kanigel introduces us to the playwright John Millington Synge, some of whose characters in The Playboy of the Western World, were inspired by his time on the island; Carl Marstrander, a Norwegian linguist who gave his place on Norway’s Olympic team for a summer on the Blasket; Marie-Louise Sjoestedt, a Celtic studies scholar fresh from the Sorbonne; and central to the story, George Thomson, a British classicist whose involvement with the island and its people we follow from his first visit as a twenty-year-old to the end of his life.
On the island, they met men and women with whom they formed lifelong and life-changing friendships. This book lets us get to know these men and women and learn of the culture of the islanders, their hard lives of fishing and farming matched by their love of singing, dancing, and talk. Sadly, we watch them leave the island, the village becoming uninhabited by 1953. The story of the Great Blasket is one of struggle—between the promise of emigration and the peculiar warmth of island life amid its physical isolation. This is the Ireland I imagine when I picture my ancestors setting sail from Ireland to America.
May 27, 2013
If you drive far enough around the Dingle Peninsula, you will come to the amazing Blasket Island Center and a fascinating story of what life was like before the last of the inhabitants left these remote Irish-speaking lands in the 1950s. To some extent this book is the story of the islanders. However, any insight into their way of life is limited because they relied on an oral tradition and few could read and write. The few exceptions created a subgenre of literature that is still important today in Irish language studies. They were encouraged by a coterie of scholars and writers who came to the Greater Blasket for research and, in some cases, became immersed in the island life. Much of the book follows the stories of these outsiders such as playwright John Millington Synge. To them it appeared that the islanders, although their life was hard, were happy with a very strong sense of community. However, once exposed to the outside world, it appears that most of the islanders wanted nothing so much as to emigrate and leave behind their traditional life. Although the book is interesting and well-researched, it is not very evocative. It was more of a chore to read than it should have been.
November 1, 2013
I have a long standing fascination with the Blasket Islands - their beauty, their isolation, their story.
The roofless jumble of stone houses perched on the steep slopes of the island look out on the tip of the Dingle Peninsula. It's only a 3 mile boat trip but such a treacherous one that the last inhabitants choose to abandon their homes forever in 1953. Only a few hundred of people ever lived there but their impact on Irish language and literature is remarkable. Irish schoolchildren have learned their culture's native language by reading the eloquent memoirs of 3 of these largely unschooled Islanders.
Robert Kanigel has told the Blasket story through the perspective of the outsiders, the scholars and linguists, who were drawn there by the chance to learn a pure uncorrupted Irish. It's an important part of the story and Kanigel does a good job of presenting it, but he occasionally gets too bogged down in details losing the focus of his story. I would not recommend it as a starting point. Hungry for Home by Cole Morton is a rich introduction to the islanders life and culture and brings their story to America and then back again.
The roofless jumble of stone houses perched on the steep slopes of the island look out on the tip of the Dingle Peninsula. It's only a 3 mile boat trip but such a treacherous one that the last inhabitants choose to abandon their homes forever in 1953. Only a few hundred of people ever lived there but their impact on Irish language and literature is remarkable. Irish schoolchildren have learned their culture's native language by reading the eloquent memoirs of 3 of these largely unschooled Islanders.
Robert Kanigel has told the Blasket story through the perspective of the outsiders, the scholars and linguists, who were drawn there by the chance to learn a pure uncorrupted Irish. It's an important part of the story and Kanigel does a good job of presenting it, but he occasionally gets too bogged down in details losing the focus of his story. I would not recommend it as a starting point. Hungry for Home by Cole Morton is a rich introduction to the islanders life and culture and brings their story to America and then back again.
August 13, 2016
I was enamored with this book at the start, but like a young schoolgirl in the throes of her first love that she married in haste; I had the remainder of the book to repent at leisure. At the end -- and it took a l-o-n-g time coming, I felt acrimonious toward the author for even writing it.
It seems there have been a number of books published about the Blaskets off the west coast of Ireland's county, Kerry and Kanigel thought he would string together enough loosely connected stories about persons that had visited the islands to eke out one more. The writing is clear, but there isn't sufficient material to make a good book. He's strung together what he could, and threw in some facts about the lives of the visitors outside of the Blaskets to improve the taste, but this soup has a weak broth, and little to no meat.
It seems there have been a number of books published about the Blaskets off the west coast of Ireland's county, Kerry and Kanigel thought he would string together enough loosely connected stories about persons that had visited the islands to eke out one more. The writing is clear, but there isn't sufficient material to make a good book. He's strung together what he could, and threw in some facts about the lives of the visitors outside of the Blaskets to improve the taste, but this soup has a weak broth, and little to no meat.
December 1, 2016
"On an Irish Island" tells the curious story of Great Blasket, an isolated and thinly populated island off the southwest coast of Ireland, and of the group of writers who were inspired by the island, its people, and its way of life during the first half of the 20th century. In the course of reading, I discovered I was not the target demographic for this work. It is a little too micro-scale for my preferences and I have no special interest in 20th century Irish literature beyond the obligatory Joyce, Beckett, etc. That having been said, I adore Kanigel's descriptions of daily life on Great Blasket and his ability to bring a time and place to life through words. I do not at all regret the time I spent on this work but, while there are readers who will find "On an Irish Island" sublime and utterly unforgettable, I acknowledge I am not one of them.
August 30, 2015
If you're not into all things Irish, this book is not for you. I had read several of the Blasket Islanders memoirs, so this was a good overview of the last fifty years of the island and how the memoirs came to be written and published. Its major flaw is that it doesn't adequately describe the harshness of living on the island, which was compensated for by its community and traditions. Eventually, as in the rest of Ireland, the young were emigrating to America as if Ireland were raising their children for export. (Among the many tidbits of information, many Blasketers settled in Springfield, MA). I greatly appreciated Kanigel's research and I plan to reread the memoirs in my library now that I have context for them.
July 8, 2014
The topic of this book was something completely new to me. Off the west coast of Ireland is an island called Great Blasket, where about 150 people made their home till the early 1950s. The book tells the story of different influential visitors who formed connections with these islanders and had some of them share their stories which then became mainstays of Irish literature. The book brings out the impact of these visits to both the visitors and the islanders and the positive connections that developed between them. It is a very positive and well-told story about a topic I never knew anything about before now.
July 31, 2012
At first was painful getting thru this bk but once I got used to the difficult Celtic words, it got better as the story progressed. This bk was one of those that you appreciated more once you started discussing it in a group. There was a lot of discussion, the mtg lasted about 3 hrs. Definitely was evocative & struck everyone in different ways. Anyone who's ever pondered escaping to a simpler faraway place will find this bk interesting. I made Irish soda bread which was a little on the hard & dry side.
March 9, 2014
Interesting book. The author writes this history almost as a novel, and I feel as if I know some of the "characters" quite well. He relates the history is an almost spiral style, introducing people, leaving them, then coming back to them as their work or something else about them relates to another person or a later event. It's at times a bit confusing, but it's an effective device.
If you're at all interested in Ireland, Irish history, Gaelic as a language or separator of men, this is a fascinating work. Lots of old photos really enhance the telling.
If you're at all interested in Ireland, Irish history, Gaelic as a language or separator of men, this is a fascinating work. Lots of old photos really enhance the telling.
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