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Full-Text Articles in Arts and Humanities

Jean Sulivan: Prophetic Voice With An Important Message For The Irish Church, Eamon Maher Oct 2019

Jean Sulivan: Prophetic Voice With An Important Message For The Irish Church, Eamon Maher

Articles

The French priest writer Jean Sulivan (1913-1980), whose real name was Joseph Lemarchand, was born in the small village of Montauban-de-Bretagne. He lost his father in the trenches of the Great War, an event that led to the remarriage of his mother out of financial necessity and which came as a serious blow to her young son. He could never fully accept the presence of his step-father in the house even though he knew his mother had had no option other than to remarry if she wanted to hold on to the small farm she rented from a local doctor. …


What Is The Role Of Faith In Our Politics?, Eamon Maher Oct 2019

What Is The Role Of Faith In Our Politics?, Eamon Maher

Articles

Forty years ago this month, Pope John Paul II came to Ireland. I was just beginning my last year in school at Saint Columb's College, Derry. It was a tense time. In the three months leading up to the pope's visit, 36 people were killed in the Troubles - including 16 Catholic and Protestant civilians. In 1979 I went to see the Pope at Drogheda and subconsciously I think his words on that occasion have possibly framed much of my thinking about this evening's theme - the role of faith in our politics.


Bernard Maclaverty: A Novelist With A Catholic Sensibiliy., Eamon Maher Jun 2019

Bernard Maclaverty: A Novelist With A Catholic Sensibiliy., Eamon Maher

Articles

Like many others I would imagine, my first introduction to the work of the Belfast writer Bernard MacLaverty (born in 1942) was through the successful film adaptations of his first novel, Lamb, with Liam Neeson in the main role, and the highly successful ‘Troubles’ film, Cal, based on the novel of the same name. Nominated for several prestigious literary awards, a member of Aosdána, author of numerous well-regarded novels and short story collections, MacLaverty is nevertheless largely neglected in terms of the critical attention he has attracted. The shining exceptions are the essay collection, About Bernard MacLaverty: New …


A Catholic Has No Allies, Eamon Maher Jan 2019

A Catholic Has No Allies, Eamon Maher

Articles

FRENCH literature of the twentieth century was blessed by the r work of writers who were explicitly Catholic while also adorning the cuIturallife of their country. Anew collection by the French Dominican publishing house, Editions du Cerf, of the epistolary correspondence between four of France's best known Catholic literati - Georges Bernanos, Paul Claudel, Francois Mauriac and Jacques Maritain - reveals serious rifts and, at times, a definite lack ofChristian charity in the sentiments these men shared with one another.1 The correspondence centres on Maritain's exchanges with the other three, which is most probably due to the fact that he …


The Half-Life And Death Of The Irish Catholic Novel : In A Country Renowned For Its Catholicism, It Is Unusual The ‘Catholic Novel’ Never Took Root, Eamon Maher Dec 2017

The Half-Life And Death Of The Irish Catholic Novel : In A Country Renowned For Its Catholicism, It Is Unusual The ‘Catholic Novel’ Never Took Root, Eamon Maher

Articles

In Underground Cathedrals (2010), the Glenstal monk and author Mark Patrick Hederman described artists as the “secret agents” of the Holy Spirit: “Art has the imagination to sketch out the possible. When this happens something entirely new comes into the world. Often it is not recognised for what it is and is rejected or vilified by those who are comfortable with what is already there and afraid of whatever might unsettle the status quo”. Reflecting on this position, one wonders to what extent Irish novelists have fulfilled the important role outlined by Hederman. In the past, they definitely did offer …


Searching For The Transcendent In The Work Of Francis Stuart, Eamon Maher Apr 2017

Searching For The Transcendent In The Work Of Francis Stuart, Eamon Maher

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No abstract provided.


Combating The Forces Of Evil : Georges Bernanos' Vision Of The Priestly Function, Eamon Maher Jan 2017

Combating The Forces Of Evil : Georges Bernanos' Vision Of The Priestly Function, Eamon Maher

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No abstract provided.


Finding Meaning In A Web Of Confusion, Eamon Maher Dec 2016

Finding Meaning In A Web Of Confusion, Eamon Maher

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No abstract provided.


Faith And Unbelief : Brian Moore's Priestly Depictions, Eamon Maher Sep 2016

Faith And Unbelief : Brian Moore's Priestly Depictions, Eamon Maher

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No abstract provided.


Struggles With The Fairer Sex : George Moore's Fr. Oliver Gogarty In 'The Lake', Eamon Maher Jul 2016

Struggles With The Fairer Sex : George Moore's Fr. Oliver Gogarty In 'The Lake', Eamon Maher

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No abstract provided.


Rendering That Darkness At The Heart Of Priesthood : The Strangled Impulse By William King, Eamon Maher Jan 2016

Rendering That Darkness At The Heart Of Priesthood : The Strangled Impulse By William King, Eamon Maher

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No abstract provided.


Eamon Maher On Jean Sulivan, Eamon Maher Dec 2015

Eamon Maher On Jean Sulivan, Eamon Maher

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www.thetablet.co.uk


Catholic Guilt : Longing And Belonging In The Fiction Of François Mauriac And John Mcgahern, Eamon Maher Dec 2015

Catholic Guilt : Longing And Belonging In The Fiction Of François Mauriac And John Mcgahern, Eamon Maher

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No abstract provided.


Why Such An Interest In Priests?, Eamon Maher Jul 2015

Why Such An Interest In Priests?, Eamon Maher

Articles

Before dealing with any more representations of the priest in modern literature, I thought it might be useful to share some personal experiences which give a context to the origin and inspiration of this series.


Faith In Our Fathers: Can You Believe In Fictional Priests?, Eamon Maher Jun 2015

Faith In Our Fathers: Can You Believe In Fictional Priests?, Eamon Maher

Articles

I was struck recently by an article that appeared in the online section ofthe Irish Times (November 14th. 2015). Written by a priest called Martin Boland, the piece was prompted by the publication of a novel by John Boyne, A History of Loneliness, which has as its main protagonist Fr Odran Yates, who is forced to live in an Ireland where the priest is more likely to be viewed as a paedophile or pariah than as a respected member of society. Clearly a novelist as disaffected as Boyne admits to being with the Catholic Church, would find it hard to …


Review :Thirty-Three Good Men : Celibacy, Obedience And Identity By John Weafer, Eamon Maher Mar 2015

Review :Thirty-Three Good Men : Celibacy, Obedience And Identity By John Weafer, Eamon Maher

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No abstract provided.


How Different Are The Irish?, Eamon Maher Mar 2015

How Different Are The Irish?, Eamon Maher

Articles

THIS review-article sets about assessing the significance of a new collection of essays edited by Tom Inglis, Are the Irish Different?1 Tom Inglis is the foremost commentator on the factors that led to the Catholic Church in Ireland securing a 'special position' during the ninetenth and twentieth centuries.2 The Church's 'moral monopoly' has effectively been ceroded by a number of recent developments; the increased secularisation that accompanied greater prosperity, the tendency among a better educated laity to find their own answers to whatever moral dilemmas assail them, and, of course, the clerical abuse scandals. But even in the 1980s, and …


Dealing With Human Weakness : Shusaku Endo's 'Silence', Eamon Maher Mar 2015

Dealing With Human Weakness : Shusaku Endo's 'Silence', Eamon Maher

Articles

Following on my recent presentation of the Catholic priest in some work by William Trevor, I have decided to follow up with a few articles for Spirituality dealing with what I consider to be some of the more insightful priestly portrayals that I have come across in world literature. For the first example, one must travel a long distance to find an author who has been dubbed the Japanese Graham Greene, Shusaku Endo (1923-1976). The novel we will be concentrating on is the writer's 1966 masterpiece, Silence.


Catholic Sensibility In The Early Fiction Of Edna O'Brien, Eamon Maher Oct 2014

Catholic Sensibility In The Early Fiction Of Edna O'Brien, Eamon Maher

Articles

No abstract provided.


'Home Is Where The Heart Is' : Arrivals And Departures In John Mcgahern's Short Stories, Eamon Maher Mar 2014

'Home Is Where The Heart Is' : Arrivals And Departures In John Mcgahern's Short Stories, Eamon Maher

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No abstract provided.


Attitude Of French Writer-Priest, Dead 33 Years, Reflected In Word And Deed By Pope Francis, Eamon Maher Feb 2014

Attitude Of French Writer-Priest, Dead 33 Years, Reflected In Word And Deed By Pope Francis, Eamon Maher

Articles

On October 30th, 1913, in the French village of Montauban-de- Bretagne, Joseph Lemarchand was born, the only child of a tenant-farming family that was ripped asunder by the death of his father in the Great War. A few decades later, as a writer-priest stationed in the Breton capital, Rennes, Lemarchand took the pseudonym Jean Sulivan, a name inspired by his fascination with the movie Sullivan’s Travels . When reading Pope Francis’ groundbreaking interview last August, I had the uncanny feeling that the new pontiff’s views strongly echo what Sulivan was writing in the 1960s and 1970s. A commitment to the …


Albert Camus And The Dilemma Of The Absent God, Eamon Maher Jan 2014

Albert Camus And The Dilemma Of The Absent God, Eamon Maher

Articles

The year 2013 marked the centenary of the birth of Albert Camus. In this article Eamon Maher considers Camus' writing on religion,focusing in particular on two novels, The Outsider and The Plaque. They offer a powerful analysis of the seeming absence of God from a world a suffering, a challenge for all who profess Christian belief.


Deciphering Irish Catholic Identities: Past And Present, Eamon Maher Jan 2014

Deciphering Irish Catholic Identities: Past And Present, Eamon Maher

Articles

This collection of essays, compiled and edited by Oliver Rafferty, is a significant contribution to making sense of the tangled labyrinth that is Irish Catholic identities. The plural is important here, as there are, in fact, multiple Catholic identities, something that is often forgotten in the rush to blandly link “Irish” and “Catholic”.


Avant - Propos, Eamon Maher, Catherine Maignant Jan 2014

Avant - Propos, Eamon Maher, Catherine Maignant

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No abstract provided.


''They All Seem To Have Inherited The Horrible Ugliness And Sewer Filth Of Sex'' : Catholic Guilt In Selected Works By John Mcgahern (1934-2006), Eamon Maher Jan 2014

''They All Seem To Have Inherited The Horrible Ugliness And Sewer Filth Of Sex'' : Catholic Guilt In Selected Works By John Mcgahern (1934-2006), Eamon Maher

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No abstract provided.


The Religious Landscape Of Walter Macken's Fictional Universe, Eamon Maher Jan 2014

The Religious Landscape Of Walter Macken's Fictional Universe, Eamon Maher

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Eamon Maher lectures in the Department of Humanities, Technological University Dublin. He is director of the National Centre for Franco-Irish Studies.


Fifty Years Of ‘The Barracks’, Eamon Maher Mar 2013

Fifty Years Of ‘The Barracks’, Eamon Maher

Articles

John McGahern’s first novel, The Barracks , was published 50 years ago, thus marking the arrival of one of Ireland’s most significant writers of the latter half of the20th century. The following year, 1964, saw the book awarded the prestigious Macauley Fellowship, which allowed McGahern to avail of a one-year sabbatical from his teaching duties in Scoil Eoin Baiste in Clontarf.


Hell, Flames And Damnation : Graham Greene's ''Brighton Rock'', Eamon Maher May 2011

Hell, Flames And Damnation : Graham Greene's ''Brighton Rock'', Eamon Maher

Articles

Reproduced by kind permission of Spirituality


Tracing The Imprint: Catholicism In Some Twentieth Century Irish Fiction, Eamon Maher Jan 2011

Tracing The Imprint: Catholicism In Some Twentieth Century Irish Fiction, Eamon Maher

Articles

In a seminal article published in Studies in 1965, Augustine Martin noted now Irish writers were characterised by what he termed 'inherited dissent', a tendency that led them to replace their original religious faith with blends of the mystical and aesthetic:


Assessing A Literary Legacy: The Case Of John Mcgahern, Eamon Maher Nov 2010

Assessing A Literary Legacy: The Case Of John Mcgahern, Eamon Maher

Articles

Since he passed away in 2006, John McGahern’s status as Ireland’s foremost prose writer in English has been reinforced by the establishment of an International Seminar and Summer School byNUIGalway and a Yearbook that captures the highlights of this event. Enhanced by wonderfully expressive photographic material and the adroit editorial skills of John Kenny, the second volume of the Yearbook has an impressive array of contributors, including Denis Sampson, probably the leading expert on McGahern’s work, David Malcolm, whose Understanding John McGahern was published in 2007, Gearo´id O ´ Tuathaigh, and Christopher Murray.