The Great Blasket - Scholars & Writers

An tOileanach - The Islandman

A small archipelago, off the south west coast of Ireland, - The Blasket Islands produced literature in the early part of the last century that won world wide acclaim. In the 1920's and 30's the Blasket Island Writers wrote of people living on the edge of Europe, a life that was governed more by the elements than any political body. Their mother tongue was the native Irish language, as the Blaskets belong to a Gaeltacht area, (an Irish speaking region). 

Comharchumann Turasóireachta Chorca Dhuibhne, the official tourism body for the region gives a descriptive insight into all facets of life on the Great Blasket. (The lesser islands in the group had been uninhabited for some time).The population of the island had ebbed and flowed over the eons, and was at its height in 1916 at 176. A recent influx had arrived from the mainland, tenants evicted from their land by rootless landowners. (The Irish counrtyside at this time was chiefly inhabited by peasants beholden to the landed gentry). Despite the hardship of island life, - "a three mile crossing to the mainland, followed by a five mile walk by road for a priest, or a twelve mile walk to reach a doctor" -  many saw it as an escape from tyranny.
The Islanders were well aware of the advantages that their seclusion afforded them,  - the baliffs didn't often bother them - and they were wary of visitors.

Feiche blian ag Fas -
Twenty Years a Growing

As I mentioned in the introductory blog, Europe was at this time witnessing an interest in philology, (the study of literature and of disciplines relevant to literature or to language as used in literature), which put the Great Blasket on the agenda of some notable scholars.
The first to come in 1907 was a Norwegian, Carl Marstrander, an Old Irish scholar and linguist. From the time he arrived he toiled with the island men both on land and sea, and earned the nickname "The Viking". His reason for visiting the Blaskets was to learn Modern Irish and he soon befriended Tomas O Criomhthain. Tomas became the professor and Carl the pupil. Even though he was among them for just a short time Marstrander gave the Blasket Islanders a new perspective on life and instilled in them an esteem of their own culture. He was followed by Robin Flower, a young scholar from the British Museum in 1910. Once again the islanders took to their new arrival and called him, Blaithin (Little Flower), he was a somewhat less swarthy than his predesessor!. It was really Flower together with 2 other English men George Thomson, the Greek Scholar and Kenneth Jackson, the Celtic Scholar who fanned the flames  and motivated the islanders to write about their own lives in their own language., and so we have An t-Oileanach (The Islandman) from Thomas  O Criomhthain, Feiche bliain ag Fas (Twenty Years a Growing) from Muiris O Suilleabhain and Peig from Peig Sayers. It is a great irony that it was the translation of these texts into English many years later which was instrumental in perpetuating the Irish language in an increasingly anglicised Ireland.

Peig

And perhaps an even greater irony as Declan Kibred in his article on An tOileanacht explains that the writers, while somewhat literate in English, were incapable of reading or writing in their native tongue. The island school only taught English. (Eradication of the Irish language had been a priority for the colonialists). The visiting scholars had convinced the writers that it would be worth the effort to acquire the fundamentals of written Irish and became their private tutors. Rarely had such an impoverished community had the undivided attention of such devout instructors.
John Eastlake in his article Orality and Agency: Reading an Irish Autobiography from the Great Blasket Island suggests that the Blasket books are of greater ethnographic  rather than literary significance. Eastlake in turn looks to Sean O Tuama to better understand this particular brand of literature. "From the Blasket Islands, in particular has come a handful of autobiographies which by common European standards are sui generis.... The only vaguely comparable series of books known to me is that by Indian chiefs describing their ancestral life before the white man's conquest" Sui generis translates as -  unique in its characteristics. It was mostlikely this uniqueness that

The Great Blasket writers put the traditional art of story-telling to new use. No longer was it concerned strictly with legends of the ancient past or fairies. The stories now dealt with the realities of their own life and times, the real dangers of the sea and storms, at the same time being full of salty comments about their neighbours. They describe a very special culture in which marriages are still arranged by match-makers, a community without any class divisions, a society which knows only a few simple tools, people who experience the hardship and difficulties of living on an island.
The Great Blasket was eventually deserted in 1953, when the remaining 22 inhabitants decided to abandon their island and went in search of a different home in the New World. But their old world lives on throught their stories which have been translated into most European languages

Living Memory - A Blasket Island Story

Research process/strategies
There was a wealth of information available for this post. Numerous authoritative sources resulted from a simple google search.
Many of the results found through the Swinburne databases are also available freely.
Orality and Agency: Reading an Irish Autibiography from The Great Blasket Island by John Eastlake and An tOileanach by Declan Kibred are two sources cited in the bibliography of many websites.
Due to their comprehensive nature and breath of subject matter I choose them as my chief sources.
The Blasket Islands: Historical Information was particularly useful in the manner in which it dealt with specific aspects of island life.



Bibliography:

Kiberd, D 2010, An tOileanach, Blasket Islands, viewed 26 October 2011, <http://irishislands.info/blaskets.html>

The Blasket Islands: Historical Information Na Blascaodai 2011, Comharchumann Turasoireachta Chorca Dhuibhne, viewed 26 Octiber 2011, <http://www.dingle-peninsula.ie/blaskets2.html>

Eastlake, J 2009, Orality and Agency: Reading an Irish Autibiography from The Great Blasket Island, Oral Tradition, viewed 26 October 2011, <http://journal.oraltradition.org/files/articles/24i/06_24.1.pdf>