Tuesday night, we’ll read Sean O’Casey’s 1923 play, The Shadow of a Gunman. The play is set in May 1920 during the Irish War of Independence and is the first in O’Casey’s Dublin trilogy, that also includes Juno and the Peacock (1924) and the Plough and the Stars (1926). Nye Heron directed a grand version […]

Our beloved friend and faculty member, poet and dog owner, Nessa O’Mahony, sent us this link to an Irish Times article about next week’s Marching Days. We’ll discuss this further when Nessa reviews the history of Ireland in Monday’s morning class. Give it a read. http://www.irishtimes.com/news/ireland/irish-news/lack-of-progress-on-the-march-1.1855651?page=1

Shortly after leaving Dublin and driving north, there was very little I could see except green hills, trees, and the occasional herd of cows. The “emerald” in “Emerald Isle” was no exaggeration. However, shortly after driving over the border into Northern Ireland, I started to notice a change. Modest and charming houses started to come […]

It seems serene enough, this Armagh, Northern Ireland, ancient seat of two cathedrals both named for St. Patrick – one Church of Ireland (with ties to the Church of England), the other Roman Catholic. But dig below the quiet (and friendly!) surface, and you see signs of conflict. One of the gorgeous stained glass windows […]

Inside my passport, haphazardly spread willy-nilly across the pages, are four entrance stamps at Dublin airport, the first stop on my now yearly journey to Armagh.  Each one represents a first impression that has become memory.  My very first trip here in 2006 was in November, over Thanksgiving Weekend, and it was dark by 5:30p.  […]

This visit is happily my third Armagh Project. This morning, early and pre-tea, I was talking with the Armagh City Hostel security warden. He asked me why we return to Armagh each summer. “It’s beautiful,” I sighed. “Everyone says that,” said he. “But I live here, and I’ve seen everything.” I breathed deeply and stared […]

1. Airports are confusing. Despite my best efforts, my plane still landed in Terminal 1. Dublin Airport isn’t that confusing, but hauling gigantic bags up escalators on 2 hours of airplane sleep isn’t easy. Granted, with only 2 terminals I was bound to land in the wrong one. I live my life according to Murphy’s […]

Coming to Ireland, I had no idea what to expect. This was my first time traveling alone, and only my second time in the UK. In my head, I pictured Armagh as a small farm town with cows roaming the fields, and assumed that the next sign of life would be ten miles down the […]

As a first assignment, we gave the students ten prompts and asked them to respond visually with factoids. I love Clare’s sense of the visual, and she taught me new facts about Armagh. Give a look. https://www.dropbox.com/s/am35kkisgts3xc5/ClareBonnymanScavengarHuntPPT.pptx