Schnitzer O'Shea

by Donal Mac Amlaigh

A novel about a poor lad who moves from rural Ireland to England to make his fortune, and who has a strange affection for words. By day he works on building sites, by night he composes poetry. When he falls down a lift-shaft and suffers a brain injury, he releases a torrent of Gaelic poetry. He becomes a TV personality, is mistaken for a bomber, and is jailed. In prison he finds the silence that he seeks.

192 pages, Paperback

First published May 1, 1987

Reviews

[Niamh · Rating 5 out of 5]

Join me on my one woman mission to make donall macamhlaigh a household name of london irish literature

[Niall Fitzpatrick · Rating 5 out of 5]

I was very glad to have picked this book up on a chance in a charity shop, it turned out to be a very intelligent, witty, enjoyable read. However I do think a lot of the humour might be lost on a non-Irish reader, especially the parts about the war between the gaelic language traditionalists, the modernists and those who want to ditch the languages rehabilitation entirely.

Our innocent protagonist Schnitzers success in Irish language poetry drags him into this battle but non of the warring factions are quiet prepared for his personal indifference to their quarrel and his random esoteric musings on the perfection of numbers.
Without going too much into the story Schnitzer O'Shea is on a mission for truth in the universe, a journey via the building sites and working mens pubs of England in the 1960s. I really wish I had found this book when I was a teenager.