Máire Mhac an tSaoi

Máire Mhac an tSaoi (born 1922, Dublin, Ireland) is an Irish language scholar and academic.^[1][2]

Background

Mhac an tSaoi was born Máire MacEntee in Dublin. Her father, Seán MacEntee, was one of the founding members of Fianna Fáil, a long-serving TD and Tánaiste in the Dáil and a participant in the Easter Rising of 1916. Her mother, Tipperary-born, Margaret de Brún, was a teacher at Alexandra College, was also an Irish republican. Her uncle, Monsignor Pádraig de Brún, was one of the most respected scholars of the Irish language in the twentieth century. Another uncle was the conservative prelate Michael Cardinal Browne.

Her husband Conor Cruise O'Brien who is now deceased was five years her senior and a divorcé. Mhac an tSaoi and O'Brien were married in a Catholic ceremony in 1962; they adopted two children, Patrick and Margaret.

Career

Mhac an tSaoi has had a lifelong passion for the Irish language and she is today one of the leading authorities on Munster Irish. She is a prolific writer in Irish. As a member of Aosdána she became a key opponent of the Catholic convert and nationalist Francis Stuart, a one-time son-in-law of Maud Gonne, for his perceived anti-Semitism.^{[citation needed]}

Her poem Jack and short story An Bhean Óg feature on the Leaving Certificate Irish course, at both Higher and Ordinary Levels, for the period 2006 - 2009.

Works

Máire Mhac an tSaoi and Conor Cruise O'Brien:

• A Concise History of Ireland Thames and Hudson, London ISBN 0-500-45011-0 (1972)

Mhac an tSaoi, Máire. Margadh na Saoire. (Baile Átha Cliath: Sáirséal agus Dill, 1956).

“Writing In Modern Irish—A Benign Anachronism?” in The Southern Review 31 Special Issue on Irish Poetry (1995).

Máire Cruise O'Brien

• The Same age as the State O'Brien Press, Dublin ISBN 0-86278-885-4 ISBN 978-0-86278-885-8

 "The First Shoe"  

Notes and references

1. ^ "Authors profile - Máire Mhac an tSaoi". http://www.coislife.ie/authors/otherauthors/mairemhacantsaoi2.htm. Retrieved on 2007-03-10. 
2. ^ "Máire Mhac an tSaoi". Irish Writers on line. http://www.irishwriters-online.com/mairemhacantsaoi.html. Retrieved on 2007-03-10.