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IRISH MILES
Irish Miles
185 pages, Paperback
First published January 1, 1947
About the author
Frank O'Connor
164 books135 followersLibrarian Note: There is more than one author by this name in the Goodreads data base.
Frank O’Connor (born Michael Francis O'Connor O'Donovan) was an Irish author of over 150 works, who was best known for his short stories and memoirs. Raised an only child in Cork, Ireland, to Minnie O'Connor and Michael O'Donovan, his early life was marked by his father's alcoholism, indebtness and ill-treatment of his mother.
He was perhaps Ireland's most complete man of letters, best known for his varied and comprehensive short stories but also for his work as a literary critic, essayist, travel writer, translator and biographer.[5] He was also a novelist, poet and dramatist.[6]
From the 1930s to the 1960s he was a prolific writer of short stories, poems, plays, and novellas. His work as an Irish teacher complemented his plethora of translations into English of Irish poetry, including his initially banned translation of Brian Merriman's Cúirt an Mheán Oíche ("The Midnight Court"). Many of O'Connor's writings were based on his own life experiences — his character Larry Delaney in particular. O'Connor's experiences in the Irish War of Independence and the Irish Civil War are reflected in The Big Fellow, his biography of Irish revolutionary leader Michael Collins, published in 1937, and one of his best-known short stories, Guests of the Nation (1931), published in various forms during O'Connor's lifetime and included in Frank O'Connor — Collected Stories, published in 1981.
O'Connor's early years are recounted in An Only Child, a memoir published in 1961 but which has the immediacy of a precocious diary. U.S. President John F. Kennedy quoted from An Only Child in his remarks introducing the American commitment to land a man on the moon by the end of the 1960s. Kennedy described the long walks O'Connor would take with his friends and how, when they came to a wall that seemed too formidable to climb over, they would throw their caps over the wall so they would be forced to scale the wall after them. Kennedy concluded, "This nation has tossed its cap over the wall of space and we have no choice but to follow it."[7] O'Connor continued his autobiography through his time with the Abbey Theatre in Dublin, which ended in 1939, in his book, My Father's Son, which was published in 1968, after O'Connor's death.
Frank O’Connor (born Michael Francis O'Connor O'Donovan) was an Irish author of over 150 works, who was best known for his short stories and memoirs. Raised an only child in Cork, Ireland, to Minnie O'Connor and Michael O'Donovan, his early life was marked by his father's alcoholism, indebtness and ill-treatment of his mother.
He was perhaps Ireland's most complete man of letters, best known for his varied and comprehensive short stories but also for his work as a literary critic, essayist, travel writer, translator and biographer.[5] He was also a novelist, poet and dramatist.[6]
From the 1930s to the 1960s he was a prolific writer of short stories, poems, plays, and novellas. His work as an Irish teacher complemented his plethora of translations into English of Irish poetry, including his initially banned translation of Brian Merriman's Cúirt an Mheán Oíche ("The Midnight Court"). Many of O'Connor's writings were based on his own life experiences — his character Larry Delaney in particular. O'Connor's experiences in the Irish War of Independence and the Irish Civil War are reflected in The Big Fellow, his biography of Irish revolutionary leader Michael Collins, published in 1937, and one of his best-known short stories, Guests of the Nation (1931), published in various forms during O'Connor's lifetime and included in Frank O'Connor — Collected Stories, published in 1981.
O'Connor's early years are recounted in An Only Child, a memoir published in 1961 but which has the immediacy of a precocious diary. U.S. President John F. Kennedy quoted from An Only Child in his remarks introducing the American commitment to land a man on the moon by the end of the 1960s. Kennedy described the long walks O'Connor would take with his friends and how, when they came to a wall that seemed too formidable to climb over, they would throw their caps over the wall so they would be forced to scale the wall after them. Kennedy concluded, "This nation has tossed its cap over the wall of space and we have no choice but to follow it."[7] O'Connor continued his autobiography through his time with the Abbey Theatre in Dublin, which ended in 1939, in his book, My Father's Son, which was published in 1968, after O'Connor's death.
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Displaying 1 - 7 of 7 reviews
September 8, 2024
Such a strange yet fantastic book, will greatly appeal to the Irish trad revival listening, Heaney loving 20 somethings that see themselves partaking in van life. This is in the same vein as the motorcycle diaries or on the road but entirely based in Ireland, by one of my favourite irish writers of late, Frank O’Connor.
Despite this being more of a diary collection/memoir of his own rather than fiction, his sharp wit is not missed and he recounts cycling through Ireland in search of beautiful ancient churches to admire their masonry, architecture etc.
Has more of a focus on (what most people would find somewhat boring) architecture, but the prose are lovely and the recounting of the characters he meets in all these rural towns across Ireland and really evokes the sense of place and particularly the time very well.
A good few scenes throughout that still hold up as being funny in a very rurally irish way even now. What’s more, I’m a big fan of O’Connors observations on conservationism throughout this book and how naive or simply ignorant irish people can be of these structures that are such important pieces of history. I will finish this with some quotes about how mistreated some of these churches were:
‘It was all so long ago that I found I scarcely remembered even what Kilmallock was like. There is a picture in the Dublin National Gallery which shows what Mulvaney saw there a hundred years ago: a street of three-storey fortified Tudor and Jacobean houses which Irish people still properly call ' castles'. That street has now entirely disappeared. A few months before we passed
through it the last good example of the Irish fortified house was torn down to make way for a modern cinema. In the ruined gable was a fine stone Tudor fireplace. Nobody in Kilmallock even wanted that. But as the inhabitants are all intensely patriotic (is it not Mr. De Valera's homeland?) they have called the cinema ‘The Sarsfield'.’
‘It is only there you realise the almost incredible achievement of Kilmallock, the one-time capital of Desmond. At the time Mulvaney painted it, it had, in spite of the ruins, the richest past in Munster. Today it has practically none. The Fitzgerald tombs rot under the open sky within the parish church while the Protestants repair to their new church on the hill, the Catholics to their grand Gothic church; and all of them, the last of their historic houses demolished, to see Hollywood films in a cinema called after Patrick Sarsfield. One glance at that dying hole, and you can understand the dreariest of Mr. De Valera's political manifestos. With a synthetic religion and a synthetic culture, what is there left but abstractions?’
TL;DR
Read this book if you love ireland 🇮🇪
Despite this being more of a diary collection/memoir of his own rather than fiction, his sharp wit is not missed and he recounts cycling through Ireland in search of beautiful ancient churches to admire their masonry, architecture etc.
Has more of a focus on (what most people would find somewhat boring) architecture, but the prose are lovely and the recounting of the characters he meets in all these rural towns across Ireland and really evokes the sense of place and particularly the time very well.
A good few scenes throughout that still hold up as being funny in a very rurally irish way even now. What’s more, I’m a big fan of O’Connors observations on conservationism throughout this book and how naive or simply ignorant irish people can be of these structures that are such important pieces of history. I will finish this with some quotes about how mistreated some of these churches were:
‘It was all so long ago that I found I scarcely remembered even what Kilmallock was like. There is a picture in the Dublin National Gallery which shows what Mulvaney saw there a hundred years ago: a street of three-storey fortified Tudor and Jacobean houses which Irish people still properly call ' castles'. That street has now entirely disappeared. A few months before we passed
through it the last good example of the Irish fortified house was torn down to make way for a modern cinema. In the ruined gable was a fine stone Tudor fireplace. Nobody in Kilmallock even wanted that. But as the inhabitants are all intensely patriotic (is it not Mr. De Valera's homeland?) they have called the cinema ‘The Sarsfield'.’
‘It is only there you realise the almost incredible achievement of Kilmallock, the one-time capital of Desmond. At the time Mulvaney painted it, it had, in spite of the ruins, the richest past in Munster. Today it has practically none. The Fitzgerald tombs rot under the open sky within the parish church while the Protestants repair to their new church on the hill, the Catholics to their grand Gothic church; and all of them, the last of their historic houses demolished, to see Hollywood films in a cinema called after Patrick Sarsfield. One glance at that dying hole, and you can understand the dreariest of Mr. De Valera's political manifestos. With a synthetic religion and a synthetic culture, what is there left but abstractions?’
TL;DR
Read this book if you love ireland 🇮🇪
August 25, 2025
What I wanted was Robert Gibbings's "Lovely Is the Lee." What I got--and what I should have expected--was Frank O'Connor at his acerbic best. After all, as he repeatedly states in this travel book, "I was never one for scenery myself, and as for air, a little went a long way with me." My main gripe with Mr. O'Connor, however, is that he sets out to write about his architecture pilgrimage, not your typical travelogue. The title gives no warning that such is the case. Architecture is a visual medium, and if you are going to write a book about architecture, ancient or modern, you darn well better include photographs or drawings to illustrate your text. That gripe aside, there was plenty to enjoy as the reader journeyed with O'Connor and his wife (Celimene, for the purposes of this book) on their bicycle expedition throughout Ireland. He does not romanticize the people and places he encounters, but describes them with the O'Connor touch. Even the architecture is not safe from his biting humor as in this description of a little church at Clonmacnois: "It has an air of the most intense decorum; if both came alive you know that the tower would go to tea with the rector while the porch got itself run in for being drunk and disorderly." Perhaps I am mistaken. With verbal descriptions like that, who needs pictures?
August 6, 2021
Frank O'Connor and his significant other travel Ireland by bicycle, exploring churches and old homes for their unique architecture. While the subject matter is outrageously boring, I was surprised to be captivated by O'Connor's writing style and his means of framing conversations he's had with locals and with his wife. I picked up this book knowing that I already enjoyed O'Connor's writing, but hoped there'd be a bit more bicycle talk, of which there was disappointingly little. However, the crisp prose held this work together for the most part. Not recommended at all for anyone's first time reading O'Connor.
February 28, 2018
What makes a good travel book? An engaging narrator? Vivid writing? History and information about the places visited? Interesting interactions with the locals? A sense of humor? High stakes for the travelers? The stakes are fairly low in this collection of short pieces, but all the other boxes are checked as Frank O’Connor, his wife and friends bike around Ireland pursuing their interests in history, architecture, and the occasional cup of tea.
May 12, 2021
A travel memoir about the author cycling around Ireland in the 1940s, usually in the company of his wife, and occasionally other friends.
The author has a witty and charming way with language, and his wry descriptions of encounters with various people are always entertaining. But you’d better have a strong interest in architectural minutiae, especially regarding old churches and chapels, because that’s what half the book is about. For me, that made large parts of the book a chore to read.
The author has a witty and charming way with language, and his wry descriptions of encounters with various people are always entertaining. But you’d better have a strong interest in architectural minutiae, especially regarding old churches and chapels, because that’s what half the book is about. For me, that made large parts of the book a chore to read.
July 15, 2024
I finally got to read this book cover-to-cover while on a long hike in the Yukon. In the end the book was mostly about churches and stately buildings and dusted with profiles of odd Irish country folks. A bit dispointingly in the end given the lack of description on cycling in Ireland.
August 5, 2008
Irish cycling memoir, circa 1940s, by Michael O'Donovan (pseudonym Frank O'Connor).
Displaying 1 - 7 of 7 reviews