Ó Conaire letters to go on display at City Museum

Galway Technical Institute (GTI) has donated a collection of letters concerning Galway’s much-loved writer Pádraic Ó Conaire to the City Museum.

The handwritten letters, from the mid-1920s, relate to Ó Conaire’s time as an Irish language teacher at what was then the Technical School, situated on Dominick Street – the donation marks the 90th anniversary of the author’s death

The archive includes Ó Conaire’s initial application for a teaching job at the school in 1925, along with references, and some correspondence regarding his later absences from work.

The writer was born in  Galway in 1882 but reared in Connemara and West Clare following the deaths of his parents. He moved to London and wrote his best works there while still in his 20s. A leading light of the Gaelic Revival and the father of the short story in Irish, Ó Conaire returned to Ireland in 1915 to continue his writing career in Irish.

In 1924, having spent more than a quarter of a century in London and Dublin, Ó Conaire returned to Galway. In January 1925, he began writing for the Connacht Sentinel, which published than more than 30 of his articles and almost 80 of his short stories over the following three years. That autumn, he applied for a job as an Irish teacher with the Tech where he worked until the summer of 1928. He died in Richmond Hospital, Dublin on October 8 of that year and was buried in the New Cemetery, Bohermore.

The Museum plans to display these letters in the near future. In the longer term, they will be added to its website where they will be accessible to researchers and all who are interested in Ó Conaire’s life and career.

It’s busy times at the Museum, which is hosting a one-day intermediate-level portrait-painting course this Saturday. This is with artist Caitlyn Rooke and is part of its Armistice commemoration programme.  The course has received funding from the Department of Culture, Heritage and the Gaeltacht through Galway City Council as part of the Decade of Commemorations programme.  Anyone interested is advised to contact 091 532460 for more information.

For more, read this week’s Galway City Tribune.

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