Word: gaelicized
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Dates: during 1970-1979
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...Recognizes Him--as every Irish hero since Telemachus and Daedalus has done. O'Coonassa has no trouble; he recognizes his father by his poverty, his fate (he is leaving the prison) and his name-Jams O'Donnell. But The Poor Mouth is as much pretence as plaint. In Gaelic putting on the poor mouth means complaining (according to the dictionary) and feigning suffering to get the advantage in a deal. O'Nolan's humour is as elusive and many-faceted as his name, but The Poor Mouth hides a smile, sure. sure...
...Poor Mouth defines, explains, satirizes and defends "Gaelic". Pick up the book for the simple pleasures of the story and in the two hours it takes to read it you'll come to abominate the word Gaelic but identify with the essence. Na Gopaleen's wit cuts through the affectations and facile enthusiams of all Gaeligores and gives a glimpse of "the world as seen by the folk in Corkadoragha", a remote "Gaeltacht". Though in the preface to the first edition, "The Editor" cautions that Corkadoragha is "without compare" and not to be taken as representative of the Gaelic community...
...Coonassa relates the story of his life in a succession of hilarious vignettes, beginning with his birth, which took place in a time and place when things "Gaelic" traditionally occur: "the middle of the night in the end of the house." Darkness, and the pigs and people lying in the rushes in the end of the house create the atmosphere of the novel throughout. The pigs, especially, make atmosphere; one chapter describes a near-fatal smothering of the O'Coonassa family due to the smell of the pigs, "and a certain Ambrose, in particular...
...Grey-Fellow," Bonaparte's grandfather, tells the young boy. Largely responsible for Bonaparte's eduction, the Old-Grey-Fellow tries to preserve the ways of the past. "When I was a child growing up," he says, "I was (as is clear to any reader of the good Gaelic books) a child among the ashes." Bonaparte's mother wants to rear her child as a true Gael; she puts back the ashes "and for five hours," Bonaparte writes, "I became a child among the ashes...Later at midnight I was put to bed, but the stench of the fireplace stayed with...
...Coonassa bemoans the passing of Gaelic tradition in the same breath as he describes the "Gaelic misery" that that tradition mean. Such phrases of lament parody the writings of self-styled "Gaelic" authors, cliche-ridden and whining. The mix of serious statement, humourous presentation, and learned parody characterizes Myles' satire. Though O'Coonassa writes his story "to provide some testimony of the diversions and advintures of our times...because our types will never be there again," a great deal of the book pokes fun at the Gaeligores who come to study Corkadoragha-but leave because the reality of tempest, poverty...