Maurice Walsh - A Time for Reappraisal?

Ballydonoghue born writer Maurice Walsh (1879-1964) was the author of some 20 novels, plus a large number of short stories, many set in Scotland or the West of Ireland and containing a mix of drama and romance. Much of his work invoked a rural Ireland that was fast disappearing in the 1930s and while little read today, at the time they proved immensely popular, being translated into Italian, Danish, French, German and Flemish. In this illustrated lecture, former editor of Books Ireland Magazine Tony Canavan explores Walsh’s writing and in particular his novels set in his own lifetime. He takes another look at Walsh as an outstanding writer of prose who deserves to be more widely read today. Tony examines the themes in Walsh’s novels and their relevance for today, in particular, the idea that he was concerned with what it is to be ‘a man’ while avoiding ‘toxic masculinity’.