Irish - Blog Posts
I love a sketch that does this; at first it's funny, you immediately get the bit. Then it keeps going and it's REALLY funny. Then they bring THAT ONE PHRASE where you lose it. Then we see it double down, the coworkers, and you think 'well, that's it, that's peak comedy right there,' and then, if you're really lucky, you're wrong. The ending somehow, someway, spins it sideways, takes it up to 11, and tops itself all over again.
the morrigan - irish mythology
So, I fell down a rabbit hole and learned two cool things in relation to the Irish language and Tolkien!
1) He seems to have tried and failed to learn Irish and thought it sounded awful XD
2) In one of his letters where he’s talking about the origin of the word nazg (Black Speech for ring), he says that he thinks it most likely came from nasc, which in modern Irish refers to a tie/bond/link and in older Irish seems to have also referred to ring-shaped jewellery (by which I mean bracelets, necklaces etc, not just finger rings). Technically, he does say that he didn’t do this consciously. He was looking up some stuff about Irish, came across the word and ‘re-learned’ it as such and thought “oop, that’s probably where that came from!” but I still think it’s cool.
Bonus! In that same letter, he describes the Irish language as “mushy” sounding and like, I get what he means? I don’t know why, but I find this description hilarious. He’s not wrong XD
(You know you live in the #centralvalley when it hits 100 degrees and you can say)What a lovely afternoon for a wedding at Old St Mary's. #calilife #rocklin brought to you by my people, #irish #immigrants (at Rocklin, California)
Contemporary Exterior Belfast Large trendy gray two-story metal exterior home photo with a metal roof
Says, I too.
“rollicking Irish song” from 1917 in honor of #StPatricksDay. From our Bella C. Landauer Sheet Music Collection. View the whole thing here: s.si.edu/1FjthLl #sheetmusic #vintage #irish #aviation http://ift.tt/1BMvKv0
people are like ”you wouldnt survive in the past“ but i would. im irish-american and would leave a strange mark if a bit you. im the perfect candidate for a kennedy’s wife
So curious sheep.. 🐑 . . . . . #ireland #ireland_gram #ireland🍀 #loveireland #natureisbeautiful #naturephotography #animals #animalphotography #animallover #folkgreen #folkscenery #outdoorlife #moodygrams #moodyphotography #earthoutdoors #exploremore #earthgallery #awesomeearth #beautifulnature #sheep #visualambassadors #visualsofearth #planetearth #planet_earth_shots #natureinspired #naturelovers #ig_color #awesome_earthpix #photographer #irish (at Ireland (country)) https://www.instagram.com/p/CG0D9zhB9hn/?igshid=1et82k4flq1yy
When we arrived to our last point of that day to meet sunset at the Atlantic ocean, we understood that we are surrounded by the mountains and to see what we wanted we were forced to climb one of these mount. Thought we won't make it, but guess what, we accepted such challenge. Took a lot of strength and we were rewarded! To see such great sunset at the end of the world was amazing! Never give up! :)
Staff Pick of the Week
As a lover of mythology and folklore, my first staff pick is The Wonder-Smith and His Son, by Ella Young (1867-1956), with illustrations by Boris Artzybasheff (1899-1965). It was published by Longmans, Green Co. in 1927 and was a Newbery Honor recipient in 1928. The book is a collection of myths from Ireland and Scotland about a legendary wonder smith known as the Gubbaun Saor, a “maker of worlds and a shaper of universes.” There are fourteen stories in the collection, detailing how the Gubbaun Saor got his world-building abilities, which involved finding a bag of magical tools that were dropped from the sky by a bird. The book also includes tales about his adopted son Lugh and his daughter Aunya. In her memoir, Flowering Dusk: Things Remembered Accurately and Inaccurately, Young wrote “I have a fondness for The Wonder-Smith; perhaps because I did not invent the stories in the book. I gathered them through twenty-five years of searching, and put a thread of prose round them.” The folktales were collected from story-tellers in Clare, Achill Island, Aranmore, and the Curraun.
Ella Young’s interest in Celtic mythology led to her becoming involved with the growing Irish nationalist movement. Many nationalist writers and artists were looking to Ireland’s history and legends for inspiration, and she befriended fellow Irish writers Æ (George William Russell), Padraic Colum, and William Butler Yeats. Æ called her “a druidess reincarnated.” Aside from publishing poetry and folklore, Yong was also involved in running guns and ammunition to the Irish Republican Army, and was a member of Cumann na mBAn, a women’s paramilitary organization that took part in the 1916 Easter Rising. She continued to write throughout the war, and in 1925 embarked for America to do a speaking tour about Celtic mythology at universities across the country. She was eventually granted American citizenship and accepted a teaching position at the University of California, Berkeley. Often described as mystical and otherworldly, Young lived out the rest of her life near the California coast writing and publishing stories and sharing her love of folklore with those around her.
Ukrainian illustrator Boris Artzybasheff fled the Russian Revolution for the United States in 1919. Beginning his career as an engraver, Artzybasheff soon became a book illustrator, some of which he wrote himself, such as Seven Simeons: A Russian Tale, which received a Caldecott Honor award in 1938. He is best known for his magazine covers, and he created over 200 covers for Time magazine alone. Over the course of his career his work evolved to become wonderfully surrealist, he loved anthropomorphizing machines so they would have human attributes and emotions. Even his commercial work in advertising has elements of the absurd. I believe Artzybasheff’s playfulness is evident in the woodcuts he did for The Wonder-Smith, and his illustrations are what drew me to the book.
– Sarah, Special Collections Undergraduate Assistant
Art from WolfWalkers (2020)
''Irish Luck''
@therealjacksepticeye
Next time a European is being a stuck up asshole, just remind them that we own the moon. They can be all like, “But the Moon Treaty says” Fuck the Moon Treaty. I only see one flag up there bitch, and it ain’t yours.