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Thursday, March 20

So that's him!

"May you always have walls for the winds, a roof for the rain, tea beside the fire, laughter to cheer you, those you love near you and all your heart might desire." - IRISH BLESSING


For St Patrick's Day this week I have 13 male Irish writers from as far back as sources provide, their claim to fame, one of their works and a quote by each them. Funny how I thought Samuel Beckett was 18th century. See which ones you may recognize at first glance as the author of a novel, play or a quote familiar to you. In my case I recognized mainly the work first (except nos. 5 & 6) and had several so-that's-him moments. Here's hoping you have fun with the list as I enjoyed putting them together.

1. Edmund Burke (1729 - 1797) known for his aesthetic treatise "A Philosophical Enquiry into the Origin of our Ideas of the Sublime and the Beautiful

"Our patience will achieve more than our force."

2. Oliver Goldsmith (1730 - 1774) known for his play She Stoops to Conquer and novel The Vicar of Wakefield

"I love everything that's old - old friends, old times, old manners, old books, old wine."

3. John O'Keefe (1747 - 1833) known for Wild Oats

"A glass is good, and a lass is good, and a pipe to smoke in cold weather; The world is good, and the people are good, and we 're all good fellows together."

4. Jonathan Swift (1667 - 1745) best known for Gulliver's Travels

"A man should never be afraid to own that he has been in the wrong which is but saying that he is wiser today than yesterday."

5. Bram Stoker (1847 - 1912) best known for Dracula

"Despair has its own calms."

6. Oscar Wilde (1854 - 1900) remembered for his epigrams, only novel The Picture of Dorian Gray, play The Importance of Being Ernest

"When I was young, I thought that money was the most important thing in life.  Now that I am old, I know that it is."

7. George Bernard Shaw (1856 - 1950) awarded the 1925 Nobel Prize in Literature

"The single biggest problem in communication is the illusion that it has taken place."

8. William Butler Yeats (1865-1939) awarded the 1923 Nobel Prize for Literature

"In dreams begins responsibility"

9. James Joyce (1882 - 1941) best known for Ulysees

"Writing in English is the most ingenious torture ever devised for sins committed in previous lives. The English reading public explains the reason why."

10.  Clive Staples or C.S. Lewis (1898 - 1963) best known for The Chronicles of Narnia

"There are two kinds of people: those who say to God, "Thy will be done," and those to whom God says, 'Alright then have it your way.'"
 
11. Samuel Beckett (1906 - 1989) awarded the 1969 Nobel Prize in Literature (gave away all of the prize money)

"In the language of extinction, precision is next to godliness."

12. Frank McCourt (1930 - 2009) best known for Angela's Ashes and won a Pulitzer Prize for it
"The master says it’s a glorious thing to die for the Faith, and Dad says it’s a glorious thing to die for Ireland and I wonder if there’s anyone in the world who would like us to live.”

13. Seamus Henney (1939 - 2013) awarded the 1995 Nobel Prize for Literature
Fellow poet Paul Muldoon said, “He was the only poet I can think of who was recognized worldwide as having moral as well as literary authority.”


“I can't think of a case where poems changed the world, but what they do is they change people's understanding of what's going on in the world.”


Visit: Favorite Things * Thursday Thirteen

7 comments:

  1. Great quotes. I always liked the exchange between Churchill and Shaw.

    G. B. Shaw sent Winston Churchill two tickets to his latest play. "Come see the opening night of my new play. Bring a friend, if you have one."

    Churchill responded, "I can't make it that night. I'll see it the second night--if there is one."

    Happy TT.

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  2. My favorite author on your list is Frank McCourt. :) Thanks for sharing.

    http://otherworlddiner.blogspot.com/2014/03/httpswww.html

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  3. Thank you for linking and sharing your sweet blog at the Thursday Favorite Things blog hop ♥

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  4. I didn't know Bram Stroker was Irish. Cool.

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  5. Replies
    1. and all dead, right? I love the human male species, and forensics fascinate me so that could be it :)

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