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Transcription
Seamus and the speaker discuss Seamus' talent for entertaining and storytelling. Seamus shares that he writes humorous verses and performs them, drawing inspiration from the traditional bard and shanachí storytelling traditions of Ireland. Seamus believes that storytelling is just as important as music in Irish culture. He tells a traditional story about a giant and a small man named Timmy. Seamus reminisces about the importance of storytelling and entertaining in his community while growing up. Hello Seamus, how are you? I'm fine thanks, how are you? You know, you're the show man, do you know what I mean? That's nice to hear, that's nice to hear You have a nice repertoire here, poets and playwrights, authors, the whole shebang going on for you Yeah, yeah, people say how do you do it? I say, well, when I was joking, I'd say, how do you do all them things? I say, well, when I was about two, my sister dropped me out of the prom on top of my head and I was never right since I'd say she's dead right now I'd say it could be true So it is, you're Cillian by Lewisburg, man That's right, that's right, yeah, Cillian behind When they talk about Lewisburg, they say, are you from back? And then back, where I come from, and behind, they call it back-back So it is, yeah I'm back-back Yeah, well sure, no harm in it No harm at all Yeah Didn't do me any harm anyway Yeah, well I don't know, we'll see now We'll find out So it is, you're a poet, so yeah Well, yeah, a lot of my, I write on a lighter note, more I would say kind of the bar tradition than the poet tradition I've written, I write both, but so, you know, with more emphasis on humorous verses When I say the bar, I suppose nowadays what they might call the performance poet You know, that I write, as I used to say, I write to recite, you know, and do my own stuff But with humorous nature, I suppose, kind of Yeah, I, yeah, yeah, because even, I noticed that in even like short stories or with plays A lot of stuff I've written is humorous, and my performance is mostly of the humorous type as well, you know Yeah But funny enough, if I'm watching plays, I like serious stuff, you know, to watch and that But performance, or even acting-wise, I suppose, yeah, humor and comedy is my thing Yeah, I know, because I see you, and it's like you nearly live off the laughter you get out of others Like, you know, it gives you some life, and like the whole room would be alight, you know, and it's great Well, I've often found, I love traditional music and singing, and people like yourself But I have a note in my head, and I don't play music And then I started doing a bit of performing and writing a bit more, and actually, then it took on a life of its own Now I find like that some people might even ask me along to sessions, or if I'm at a place, you know, I can actually The happy thing is that the stories and recitations are part of the traditional session So that's great, because I can happily listen to songs, other people's songs and stories, and maybe even dance a step But I can do my own stuff as well then, and yeah, sometimes a bit of humor lifts a session too, sometimes Yeah, and I think that's the thing, like, when you're talking about traditional Irish traditions and singing and music and stuff You're kind of always thinking about trad music, and you know, sessions, and the flack, and all that stuff But that's only, it's wonderful, but it's only a part of the culture, do you know There's a whole, the storytelling is as big as the music, like in my opinion anyways It was, and back in the day it was very much a part of it, yeah Yeah, like, I think that's kind of made what Ireland, given us our reputation, has been a bit of a crack light, you know The boys went off to America and Australia and stuff, they carried their traditions with them, you know, the storytelling, the shanachí The shanachí, yeah, the bard and the shanachí, yeah Yeah, and I would, I do stories as well as doing the recitations, I do stories as well And so, like, in that regard too, in that I came from, I straddled through traditional, you know, I was coming into the modern, more modern era But I also had the experience of growing up with storytellers, you know, older people telling stories And it was, it's probably quite different to what I'd be doing myself nowadays But it was the same, the same, it's still storytelling, you know And like, I'm just thinking there now, maybe it's, could I think of a small example of a traditional type of story that I might tell Like this story would be an example of the more traditional type of storytelling that I would have heard going back in time The story of the giant of Sharmour was handed down to me by my grandfather The giant's name was Cacha, which means a fighting man There was not a day he wouldn't arrive home with three or four hens under his large coat And that was only for his dinner If Cacha said he wanted your hens, there was no man would contradict him One night a big storm swept across the area and took the thatched roof clean of the four walls of his cottage By first light he knew there was nothing for it but to go down to the oak wood and get a new main beam that would span the length of the roof Well if his roaring and swearing didn't raise every bird from the branch where they'd rested, then the swift swift swipe of his hatchet certainly did On the fifth swing the tall oak tree fell As Cacha, the giant, stepped back he saw the smallest man he had ever come across What do you want it for? The wee man said He had a very high pitched voice for such a low sized little man But before Cacha could answer he fired the next question How will you get it home? How will you get it home? I'll carry it on my shoulder Cacha said I'll help you, I will, I will, I will The small man said Cacha's great laugh shook the branches Who are you anyways and where do you come from? Cacha asked I'm Timmy and I came a long way And your business in these parts? Cacha asked I'm a cobbler you see The other day I was sharpening my knife on the leather belt when I saw twelve flies on the table I swung my belt and I killed the twelve flies with a single blow I told the wisest man down our quarter He was surely impressed by such a fine deed I never heard of the likes of a man killing twelve flies with a single blow I declare you're the strongest man in Tiroli Where, where would I find my equal? I asked him He consented a while for a wise man will never rush to an answer There's only one man in all of North Mayo would equal you Did he tell you who that man might be? Cacha asked He told me he was a giant of a fighting man that lived down this way He might show me where he lives seeing as I'm going to help you All the while they were talking Cacha was pulling large branches off the oak tree with his bare hands to make it easier to carry There were still several branches left and the wee man jumped up on one of them when Cacha put the log on his shoulder When Cacha stopped for a rest the little man hopped down unseen by the giant and he scolded Cacha Why are you stopping? I'm not tired at all, precious as it is here I am Cacha jumped up in a temper and threw the tree back on his shoulder whereupon Timmy hopped back on the branch He remained there with his short legs clasped in comfort until the giant stopped for another rest Timmy was beside Cacha before he could turn around and started to bligard him again We'll never get home, we'll never get home, the pressure I'm getting The wise man was right, there's a fierce power in me bones That's how he continued until he reached the ruthless home of the giant His wife came out to greet her husband Cacha threw down the log with such temper that it sank from sight in the potato ridges Where did you get the wee runt? she said when she spotted Timmy I helped him and only for me he'd never get home, Timmy said to the giant's wife The giant didn't join his wife in her laughing for he had finished with laughing Before darkness fell Cacha had the roof back on his house Now said Timmy as he rubbed his hands in glee, I want to be out here in the morning to finish off this giant for good I'll take you to him in the morning Cacha said They showed Timmy to his despair room I'll kill him in the night the giant said to his wife But Timmy had his ear to the bedroom door and heard it all Timmy slipped out through the window that was so small it would hardly let through a well fed cat He found the bloated belly of a cow that Cacha had dined on and dragged it to his bedroom He placed it under the blankets and hid himself beneath the bed He was enjoying a good sleep from the exertions of the day when the giant sneaked into the room quietly Cacha hit three mighty blows on the shape of the bed causing the bloated belly to explode in all directions with blood and gore He's dead now he said to his wife Early next morning Cacha was sitting with a large pot of stir about that his wife had cooked for his breakfast When Timmy appeared from the bedroom stretching himself and rubbing the scrams from his eyes Good morning we man Cacha said and he hid his surprise Can I give you some of my breakfast Don't mind the stir about he said don't mind the stir about just take me to the giant I won't rest till he's dead Cacha lowers his head I got sad news this morning I said The giant died suddenly during the night And that was the end of the search for the giant For the wee man never knew that it was indeed the giant himself that was facing him Now put on the kettle and make the tea and we finish the story here Class, great Cacha I would run as fast as I could until I was past the graveyard in case anybody might grab me But you had the hair of a stand in the back of your head going home alright With some of the stories they'd be telling but that was a more humorous version Yeah and was that a big thing when you were growing older kinda Maybe going to other people's houses That's right yeah I mean I would have been like well in my teens before we got a television I had a wire that's alright and a cat playing in the winter People would go to a house to entertain each other I remember people coming to our house as well and they were just telling stories or having a crack Yeah I'd say that had a big influence on you when you were younger I suppose I straddled two different kind of fears I came from that background of coming towards an ending That background of visiting and storytelling and television was coming on a lot more Not too long after that every house a television So a lot of that kind of stopped up But I was still steeped in it and it did influence me as I went along I suppose the nature of the performer was in me as well too As I've done a lot of action and everything else since So it would be the combination of both But definitely I was influenced by that kind of background You wrote a book there before, well you probably wrote it a good while ago But you launched it there before Christmas It's brilliant, I'll throw it up so that other people can see maybe on social media or whatever It was great and I absolutely adore it But it does talk a lot, it's kind of set after the famine isn't it It talks a lot about the old traditions That's right The Heart of the West is the title And then the subtitle actually is A Journey of Hope After the Famine The famine was, I mean times were still hard then But it has more hope to it And it's not as bleak a story as it sounds And while it is very much related to the real history in my area It's fictionalised, but it's based I suppose 90% on exactly what happened And what was the way of life and all that And like you say, when I was saying earlier about striking two areas When I'm talking in the book about things like maybe Cork fishing with hand lines or maybe killing a pig I actually did experience that And it would not really have been any different in my day Than at the turn of the 19th century So it was easy enough to, and then having help from my parents and everything And of course a big, one of the influences for the novel was That my great grandmother when she died at the age of 108 in 1956 Just before I was born really She was the last survivor of the famine Because she lived to be 108 So that was featured, that's part of the novel as well That's some story isn't it, your grandmother That's classic I mean and she, like for a woman that came from the famine times And she lived, before she died she saw her grandsons Like my father in other words, with a car and a tractor And that was another change from the My father arrived back with the first And bought the first tractor in the parish And he would be gone working for people From the mid 50s up until about 1970 When people started to get their own tractors He would be off working for people Cutting hay all summer Or bringing home turf in the autumn And in the springtime putting it out Down with the tractor and trailer from the dumb heaps And so, in fact I wrote a little poem about that there And I wrote it actually for my mother's 80th birthday But it was, because she used to be always telling me The little, the little Fergie Grey as they tended to call them People could refer to the Ferguson To Master Ferguson And coincidentally they were built in Common Tree In Bannerley in Common Tree And her, my aunt's, my uncle-in-law if you want to call him My aunt's husband, he actually worked in Master Ferguson But yeah, this is a little poem I wrote about the little Fergie Grey Since life began the farming hand He toiled with horse or mule The side of spades so simply made His only working tool But for mortal man there's a bigger plan And progress will hold sway And the biggest yet in Mayo West Was our little Fergie Grey She would paint a grey, as some would say To match our western sky With her four gear she would safely steer With booster low or high And ploughing up a furrow With a puff of smoke she'd say Come seagull crow to speed in time Round our little Fergie Grey In bog and marsh that did seem harsh She quickly gathered fame And all amazed they stood and gazed And whispered out her name While men who choose a single life Most wistfully would say I never met a maiden yet Who'd match your Fergie Grey She winded home by white sea foam And drew wreck from the shore Of which steam may her bourne On a frosty morn Drew dung from the stable door Lowered high, smoke towards the sky With that heap she'd steady stray A winning beast on rubber feet Was our little Fergie Grey Now we see her on St. Patrick's Day Parading through the town A memory of her passing times Like the magic circus clown And some will sigh from an eye A tear they'll wipe away And bless the day we first did say Our little Fergie Grey Like I say, the same way we're all Electricity coming as well too And I remember going to We had electricity when my father Came back because he bought the farm And he had electricity and organised That before he came But I remember going to villages near me Where we would be playing cards To the tiddy lamp, the oil lamp Or just telling stories or whatever And I actually I wrote a few humorous verses once About electricity coming In fact, it was an entry that was shortlisted For the Baird, I performed it up in Armagh At the Baird of Armagh And might give a few verses to that I call this More Power to Ye Right at the start of the Bible God split the dark from the light But man discovered electrics And tried to banish the night I mind when we got the power With poles running up to the door We took one bulb in the kitchen That showed up the dirt on the floor My ma thought the bulb it was handy To help her when lighting the lamp The light in the village would blind you Like some class of military camp The father's a terror for reading He stayed up till late in the night I feared of the bulb in the ceiling He'd wake me to turn out the light I remember my sister when shaving With blood right up to her knee Now it's done from the socket With a gentle buzz like a bee The school said goodbye to the chlorine The electric has spanned the slide rule Now the power is there for computers We soon have no need for the school For now it's all computers No word falls from their lips As teacher sits and feeds them On a diet of microchips Ah just lately I'm blessing the power In New York a girl I have met She loves it when we go out surfing On the grandson's old internet Yeah the wonders of the electric Like that magic eye out the back That floods your way just like daylight And your hump's carrying turf on your back So here's a drink to the current And the man who made it first flow Farewell to the wick and the lamp For I'll stick to my fluorescent glow Never mind running electricity A lot of people didn't even have running water at that time And these were all the changes That was coming fast and furious I mean people think now there's huge changes And the way technology's put Like then really in a way the changes were even bigger Because from what people were coming from The electric, the light, running water, the motor care Yeah it was massive I suppose I suppose that was interesting like you know Growing up through that change I'd say Yeah so exactly so that's why I say I straddled two eras In fact I go back that far That I actually remember my first encounter with a teabag I was fortunate enough in the From say when I was in Intercept to Leaving Cert That I worked on Brighton Seafront Would you believe it? Big change for a lad from the back end of Mayo Selling hot dogs and ice cream cones I'm sure they must have found it a bit strange to hear Me chanting my hot dogs and beeper Ice cold drinks, drinks from the ice Sounded funny in a Mayo accent But I actually My uncle lived in Brighton and he brought me there So I stayed with a couple that I worked for And they had a daughter with them But the first day he dropped me off And the nice people they brought me up And sat me at the little kitchen table And they went cooking me a nice bit of grub So they brought out the kettle And a dash of milk And a jug And a little small see-through bag of tea leaves Now I'd always collect I'd give them the job of collecting the tea Along with my grandmother's pension From Tom Maguire's post office On a Friday And he would buy it by the tea chest And weigh it out into half pound bags And he even had a little stamp That he used to put on his bag And it said on the tea bag Saying honest tea is the best policy And so That was the way we got our tea So when I was sat at this table And I was looking at this little see-through bag of tea leaves And wondering what to do with it And I decided the only thing Was to tear it across the top And spill the contents into the mug I did and I poured water on top of it And a dash of milk in By the time the doctor of the household came in I was sitting there and I gave her a smile With tea leaves back to my two ears And she called her mother And well they nearly went on their knees For all the world as if they were going to say the rosary Well I knew in that pagan country They weren't going to say the rosary But that they were going to bligard a young lad For the rest of the summer of 1973 Just because he had never before seen A small see-through bag of tea leaves So that was my first encounter with a tea bag And that will give you an idea Of how the changes I encounter Class, class Yeah that's mad jazz, the tea bag I suppose I take it for granted Yeah that's funny It was just a small example of Who would ever think of it nowadays I'm sure there's very few people can remember When they saw their first tea bag It's just something that was always there with most people But that is actually, that is true Like back then we fished from From corrux And you were mentioning about the novel And talking about corrux fishing But we actually did that We had a corrux And we fished with hand lines from the corrux And so It wasn't that When I was describing it in the book A boy fishing with his father I was really describing my own life really So it wasn't that A hundred miles removed from my own life So it was I was talking about something I knew about Same like things like We killed a pig every year And would Have it, cut it up into chunks And it was sorted And put it into an oak barrel And have it there for the winter And my mother would take out a piece of bacon And steep it overnight Get the salt out of it And just boil it up And have it with a bit of bacon And a bit of cabbage and spuds And that was it And people used to salt fish as well And smoke them sometimes in the chimney But they were all Things that we were doing Seaweed We actually gathered and exported seaweed To Wales as well Until the early 1970s We were from A particular seaweed called Schlauch Some places they call it Schlauchhorn And We exported it to Wales Where they made a bread called Laver bread Because I think I think Laver was the English word For that particular seaweed Which we just called it Schlauch So That was another That was another Change in the era I mean going from picking Sea rods and Schlauch At the sea As it's called the sea In West Mayo To working on the seafront in Brighton And I used to Try to imagine my father saying Go down to the seafront there And gather some sea rods But it was A contrast Schlauch was no harm When did you kind of Start writing these Humorous poems and stories and stuff Well Actually Initially the first one or two Was actually on Topical events And I had them in the Mayo News And I put them in under the pen name Of Shea Mayo And so Actually I remember one of the first ones Was about when they started taxing The farmers And my father came home from the pub And he says He referred to some Character he met and this man He was You know He'd start telling you some news or story And he'd start right in the middle And walk back from there Like so On this particular night He walked into the pub and my father Was telling me after and he says He said to my father James did you hear it They're going to tax the billy goat That was his way of introducing The fact that what he'd been reading About the government was going to start And so I thought they're going to tax the billy goat And I took it from there They're going to tax the billy goat All over West Mayo They said it out in Brussels a month or two ago They're coming from the revenue Of the Shannon Broad and White There's no place for the billy goat There's nowhere left to hide And it goes on like this And I had that in the Mayo News Because it was topical at the time And didn't they write another one When the first time they planted A tree they started There was a lot of controversy Because they were using some of the Parking places in Westport town To plant trees So I did a tongue in cheek one on that as well That it was to get the Subsidies for forestry But then I moved on from there To more universal themes And ones that I perform And It evolved from there And So I took on a life of my own After that Fair play The humour stories There's something else I don't know how well these have come across On these microphones But when you're sitting in the pub And you're all having laughs There's something so special About someone standing up and saying The stories and everyone just laughing You can just There's some sense of relief you get Well That's my favourite Kind of performance Space Not necessarily because it's a pub But that's a smaller Venue like that where I can actually have Where I'm actually have eye contact With all the people Sometimes people ask me On a performer in a bigger place Do you have a microphone on a stage? No I do that, I mean I'd be on a stage for plays And all that, that's totally different But for that type of thing I love just Where I don't need any amplification And where I can actually Just feel like I'm surrounded By the people I'm talking to I love that atmosphere And happily It is the atmosphere Where you will find Around traditional music and singing It's great to see now The Ramblin' House is coming back in again And young people like yourself Coming to enjoy it too It's something that's Been there a long time And it's great to see it Having a good resurgence And people With the various elements Of a session, music, singing Dancing Stories, recitations The whole lot Everybody doing their own thing I have no experience Of that Like you said, people come around to the house But I hope now this can give me The right kind of idea Of what it was like back Before kind of television And the internet and stuff And people travelling to houses and ramblin' houses As you say The crack that was there, people just had to entertain themselves I suppose was the big thing That's kind of what started it all Exactly I suppose There was life before television And that's the way it was And the other thing People probably Before my time didn't have much money For books, but even if they had It was very hard to read books With the bad lamp If you were Lucky enough to have a lamp, a lot of people didn't have Lamps, what they would have was Maybe Moose fat or the fat of an animal And The wick The wick would be The centre of a Dried The centre of a rush Along Strong rushes And the outside The centre of the rush Would actually be steeped in the oil and burnt As a bit of light We're well familiar with rushes in this part of the country That's for sure Terrible land Bad language or whatever Terrible land Great land for rushes, surely Well The first song, or the first story I always remember performing The one that I just Be giggling at now, no matter where I talk Was Billy the Sheep Yeah, Billy And that was Based on truth One dark evening I hit a ram on the road And I was heading out of the Home place and my brother He's now running the farm And he's a sheep farmer And we were debating how The ram got to be on the road And this was our conclusion He bought that ram in Ballinrobe One fine September day And little did the farmer know The ram he bought Was gay He turned his back and suffocated As he eyed up a weather And as the other rams did court He lay down in the heather And then another ram went lame A third He fought and lost The answer came that very night As the farmer turned and tossed Just back the road he did recall Was a ram of highest fame With jewels that hung down to the ground Big Billy was his name Big Billy He lay idle, his owner was away And should borrowing is no crime And this time a ram might stray Though his oars were in a hurry There was no time to lose And with poverty before his face He knew he had to choose The owner might be coming back He might arrive quite soon So he planned it for that very night At the rising of the moon But most men can tell That though your oars Are panting with desire You should not take A well hung ram Across a high barbed wire And that was why Upon two barbs His jewels did shine that night As the most And with their oestrogen The oars cried for his plight For a ram without his precious sack Is not a ram at all And no more use To man or beast Than a titty in the doll With Big Billy's spirits Lower than the bag That once hung there He decided for this bitter world He did no longer care He spied the lights upon the road Of a fast approaching car And with what little strength he had He bolted for the tar Oh Big Billy he was lighter now For he had lost a load And with what little strength he had He bolted for the road He quenched the lights Of that passing car As his own life did expire Next day the owner Found his jewels As they dried upon the wire Big Billy's grave Was quickly dug On land as steep and hilly And they changed his name For evermore They now just call him Billy Billy Oh I'm trying there now not to be laughing And ruining the recording But it's very awful hard So it is Billy, Big Billy That was based on the A ram I did hit on the road Yeah That's the first memory I have anyways of you Performing and stuff And no matter when you do that You'd always get a laugh Of course I know That's not from around The West Mayo You will get sheep on the road But usually not very expensive rams Like that one That was the difference But poor Billy anyways Came to a sad end One of the stories I remember You telling us about You have a camper van You used to go travelling in the camper van And you missed one of the Ramblin' Houses And you came back and you told the story About the camper van And your son, what was that now? That's right I've had a camper van now for about 16 years And during Covid I actually Bought a van and I Converted my own camper van To do it all myself Like ready I've been in that same camper van To Spain, north of Spain And France And in May I'm going to go to Wales For a few weeks So each year now I go for nearly a month Somewhere in the camper van But as it happened From day one, my wife She never went in the camper van And a bit, no more than Billy, the ram I wrote this initially As a family kind of Story because I bought this Because my wife never went in it You know So yeah I know What you're What you're talking about there And I'll give a few verses of that now as well With the children all grown There's just her and me And there's definitely chance now She'll play on my knee The skeletons have flown And the nest it is bare But still, there's things we can do Now we're free of their care So I bought us a camper To surprise her you see So she'll take to the highways With the sat-nav and me The bed it is narrow Just a tight squeeze for two And for somewhere to go There's a chemical loo But Women are funny Says she I've one fixed abode And the people I came from never slept on the road Still, I check water and oil And the wheels are pumped tight I'm ready for road at the first break of light But when I get back I'm locked out of my home With a note on the door saying she's gone off to Rome Our boy comes along like he hasn't a care Says he Let's go surfing to the county of Clare And I'm thinking It might be a chance For some bonding maybe Just the boy and the surfboard And the camper with me Oh he swims out On a wave and comes back Back every time I'm thinking that boy Will see a watery grave Still He's the generous kind He'd make your heart bleed Says he If you buy the shop and I'll cook the feed So I bought us strip lines That's his favourite grub And after he allowed me Buy him pints in the pub I'm thinking This bonding is getting awfully dear But still Hotshelf is in Rome And at least he's here About the third pint I see his eyes stray Without one further word He's up and away Oh sure boys will be boys I was one myself And it won't be some shyness If he's left on the shelf Well I remember quite clearly It was late when I leave But quite clearly I see The boy with the blonde Between the camper and me And he steps into My camper which is Marilyn Monroe And hands me the surfboard Like I've somewhere to go Oh soon it does rock And soon it does roll To be safe I've attached to a telegraph pole While out in the night Where all folks can see Sleeping under the hedge Is the surfboard and me I worked hard at bonding Sure a man can't but try But I'm ready for Malby At the start of July And when I meet all my friends Down in Malltown Malby There'll be no surfboard Nor boy, just the camper and me So yeah, that was another move on And now I love my camper van And it's great for the Trad festivals And various other List of old writers we go to And things like that Sometimes even if you're just going For a night somewhere You can just sleep outside The pub where the session is on Or wherever I think I'll try to head down To Milltown Malby this year For the festival To go and do what I can see Oh yeah, I go for a few nights every year It's great Then I go to Fiekle as well And Drumshambo And of course one of the greatest festivals Is in my own hometown of Lewisbrook Fela Kiss Tune So they start off the year And now I've added Newport has been added To the travels Yeah I know Newport is great I think that was a nice move there Got in at the start of the new Fela Vrij The new bank holiday Yeah And even a few of the days now We'd be heading away with the Ramblin' House We were up there in Laugherdon A few months ago I remember a man said There's no service in Laugherdon So we were there And the night kept going And we kept having craic And we were all Bridget and Mary And we were all up having great craic I was trying to I was looking at the phone I was like I've no service here now I bet your mam is going sick and crazy And sure it wasn't about 2 or 3 o'clock by the time we got home And me hopping off the bus with yourself And Mary Connolly And mam sitting there in the couches She was laughing herself to be fair The social life I found myself Oh yeah I mean that was an example I brought the camper to Laugherdon The next morning I got up And I went for a good long walk There and after that I went on up to Slough Somebody had asked me to do a bit of a form A bit of a charity gig So I made a weekend of it Making a name for yourself Just having the craic Along the way Yeah I know the camper fans Bring you new leaves of life Ties in very well with that whole lifestyle I'd say now with all your travels And festivals You have a great crowd of friends You actually hit the nail on the head I have actually And it's There are people from different counties And I just meet them They're good friends We meet a few times a year At festivals We might not even bother texting Or saying we're going We just meet there And it's just so natural There's one Man up in Tubba Corrie And he puts on a specific night Which is unusual A specific night of just storytelling And recitations And maybe a couple of songs But it's For someone like myself Apart from being good craic It's like a reunion Because I meet people there From several counties That I would have met During the year at other events And it's nearly like a reunion So that's good craic as well That is I suppose the dream To be travelling around the place Playing music And having the craic There's the flags down in Wexford This year My mom's from Wexford So head down for a fly this year What part of Wexford? Castle Bridge It's actually That's one area That's next to my list To actually explore That whole Wexford Watford area I'm well over to a visit down there I love it It's very special to me It's like home I don't think they probably have as rich Culture of music And singing and stories Being on the east coast Like all across the east coast Here in Mayo and Clare And Donegal and Gough There's a really rich tapestry Of music and culture And history In the west coast Absolutely, and I become more aware of that When I do go To the east East coast And it varies From place to place It's different As well I find On the east coast Yeah It just seems A different kind of There's lots of music and everything like that But it just doesn't seem the same kind of Culture as in the west Or something I probably get no abuse For saying that But it's It's what we're used to It's how we're seen So we understand it The Klubé And Crowpatrick The Wild Atlantic Way Yeah You have a story And there's a lot of people With the Gaelic language And yeah The Tuiscat of today And the Gaelic language And There's a lot of people That are On the coast And they speak the Gaelic language Yeah It's lovely Even reading your novels You have phrases and bits of Irish in it That you probably grew up with It's definitely It's not as rich as it once was When I was growing up There would have been nearly a word or two Of Irish in every sentence And we There was words I didn't even know there were Irish Like If you said to somebody now To a young person now Crap up your sleeves They would think you were Actually making a really weird Suggestion Of using their sleeve for a toilet But Crap The Irish are the craps The wankly Wrap up your sleeve Crap is the Irish for wrap up That was a good example Ourselves She would say If you were washing your hands And your sleeves were hanging She'd say crap up your sleeves We took no notice But if you were to say that now Crap up your sleeves It would be a good name for a reel But there was loads of words Like for example a spade We always just said Even speaking in English We would say a lye And a lot of seaweeds I didn't know the English for them But yeah There was As I said There was nearly a word or two of Irish In nearly every sentence So you can imagine the generation before myself It would be more so So when I was writing that book It was very much at a time of transition From Irish to English So it would have been really unnatural Not to have some Irish in it I was in a lucky situation Where I was part of a group Where we were Critiquing each other's writing Of other historical fiction writers In the early stages And there was a dozen of us in the group And none of them were Irish And it was great But they all They all said like Oh yeah I can see you had to have some Irish in that And I also Gave me some good From the feedback I was able to fine tune how I used the Irish So that was You can read it and not know a word of Irish It's just kind of subtly explained Yeah, yeah, it's beautiful I love the language It's so It's very special to me Yeah and like Growing up in De Guelph school Well I went to De Guelph school there in Westport And growing up in Newport And of course what you probably don't even realise I was the co-leader of the Foundation committee of De Guelph school I was big into this Starting up De Guelph school It's great, it's a pure asset Like And Clubea and stuff And all the islands Do you have a story about the islands? Well talking of islands I mean I would have gone to school with people From the islands and all that But apart from that Up until recently I have one great connection I had with the islands That there's A football competition Like Comortas, Pelham and Elan That's Involves all the And all the inhabitants of the islands there on the west coast So I went for I'd say about 15 years continuously I went as physio In a stork football team Now that would also help out Clare Island, the neighbouring island as well Even though there was great rivalry there But I knew all them lads And indeed as time went on I would be helping out Every team But basically I was with Innis Dirk And I went with that so I have great friends there And it gave me a great chance I visited I'd say All the inhabitants islands From Arran Moor in Donegal To up the tree, all the Arran Islands And of course Clare Island, Innis Dirk, Innis Boffin Bear Island And It was a great way To see all the islands and meet people The competition would be played over a weekend And it was It Kind of hadn't been since Covid Now it didn't kind of get back on the Fully as well but It was some great times With that With that Inter-islands football competition Some sessions I'd say Absolutely yeah I make great friends out of it It's another restaurant in my life Yeah The other day Maybe the one before that You told us a story about One of the A couple out of Clwb Would you tell me that There again Because I adored it, it was great There are 365 islands Clwb they say And I'd say just like my story That's pure true Well and it was one of these islands Which shall be nameless Luckily there's 365 so you'll have a job to get There was a couple And they were married For 8 years Before they had a child And after 8 long years They were so thrilled when the child Arrived, the baby arrived That the wife dispatched the man Into the mainland To put the berth on the paper She said you can have a few drinks along the way Don't worry And put the berth on the paper So he went in anyways And he did, he put the berth on the paper And he had met a few people he knew And had a good drink And he came back As he was rowing out And he was rowing towards the island He could see her standing On a little headland Holding the baby looking at him And he arrived in And he was all excited to have another look At the new baby And I mean after 8 long years Waiting How would he not be excited So anyways he caught up with the wife And he tied up the curragh And they were walking Up the road towards the house And she says to him You put the berth on the paper John He says oh I did, I did, I did And she said well not that it matters now On this joyous occasion After waiting 8 long years for our first child But she says do you mind me asking you She says how much did it cost you Well he says I'll tell you the truth now it cost me 600 pounds She says what 600 pounds to put the berth on the paper Now he says woman don't be Getting on to me I did what you told me I went up to the desk And I told the girl what I wanted the berth on the paper And she says how many Insertions And he says 6 times a week For 8 years Laughing Laughing Laughing That is class Oh yeah I probably don't do justice now But um Oh yeah it's just class and you have a room full of people Like they just react right Exactly Yeah I suppose there's a lot of stories you can't tell You can't tell them anymore now Everything is so politically correct Well hopefully now This gets up on the internet And it's not taken down straight away Yeah Exactly That I'm not cancelled Yeah cancelled yeah Please God no I don't know what you'd do then Yeah I wouldn't do So Yeah so um Chile I would probably wrap it up Would you do one more story For me It's the one I know everyone loves now It's you head up Crowpatrick And sure doesn't your man have a great time When he's heading up there So it is Yeah it's a little For any that might be coming to claim Crowpatrick Our holy mountain For the men folk My sister in America She tells me get a life And send me on this mighty book On how to find a wife Now go where you'll meet people That's what the good book said A foolproof way you'll see To find someone to wed Well the idea came to me As I sat there propounding What better place to meet a crowd Than on God's holy mountain Now I'm still mighty nifty For a man of fifty three Plus VAT On Sunday I still bring me boots And if they're stuck I play for Junior B I told the mammy I was going Says she You want me to send her For I kept my counsel to myself And I knew I'd back the winner With stout new boots And woolly hats I started my ascent The women passed me every side The higher up I went And some were there because of sin And me To pray I could And it's hard to keep a good girl down But they say to try is good So there I was with Pious face my yack I'm doing a station When I see her flying Through the air to the spot Where I am waiting I grabbed her as she's flying So she's only skin and bones And I saved her from an instant death On them sharp rocks and stones She looked at me with big blue eyes And blonde hair Except the roots A little scuffed about her waist And them special nilling boots You saved my life You holy man She sounded like a Swede You saved my life You holy man I'll give you what you need Is there anything that you desire Just to complete your life Because as I does a little thing I was looking for a wife Oh come down the hill with me She said I'll treat you like no other Alright says I One pint in campus And I'll take you home to mother Slow down slow down You holy beast Please don't tempt the sinner Well then says I We'll hit Westport And have the proper dinner And the finest soup and ice That we started out to dine Followed by cuts of an Angus bull And the reddish chilli and wine I washed it down with porter And she a bicardi breezer Me that she'll be home eating That Pollock man took from the freezer You stays the night Oh says I The dog's not fed Well said she You feed your bitch Here she in my bed Now like a cow to the bull Is put once a year So oh lord close your eyes And maybe one ear Up the stairs Quick squeak of cod liver oil From the bottle I keep in my pocket Lounge unthrown across the floor And I launch on the bed like a rocket And act says she Serling Was I see very first I'm up on me elbow And me part of the third I'm looking at her with the sleep upon me Why says I Why you and ninth Lift on down in nineteen seventy three Next morning the Angelus Woke me from my slumber That blonde was gone And she left no number Quick deck to contrition And I hit the road Now you know the mother In her nagging mode The dog's not milked And the cow's not fed And you stayed away from your cosy bed Ah says I And now to the dog's dinner You were wrong when you said I wouldn't meet a sinner Well I'll be on the reek again this year Doing my penance with Pious Lee Praying that God in his infinite wisdom Might make another woman fall for me Oh Clashamous Well Thank you so much for coming on the show I hope everyone enjoys it now Well thanks I hope I'm not cancelled now for being politically correct or anything like that Might have to go on for a bit of penance I might have to do another time of the week So that's it I hope you all enjoyed it Thank you for listening Take good care of yourselves and we'll talk to you soon Goodbye
