The Humour Of Ireland

Author : D. J. O'Donoghue
Publisher : Forgotten Books
ISBN 13 : 9780267438624
Total Pages : 458 pages
Book Rating : 4.4/5 (386 download)

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Download or read book The Humour of Ireland written by D. J. O'Donoghue and published by Forgotten Books. This book was released on 2018-02 with total page 458 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: Excerpt from The Humour of Ireland: Selected, With Introduction, Biographical Index and Notes C'daly and other satirists met with a retribution from those whom they had rendered wild with rage. In the early native literature the Saxon of course came in for his share of ridicule and scorn; but there is much less of it than might have been fairly expected, and if the bards railed at the invader, they quite as often assailed their own countrymen. One reason for the undoubted existence of a belief that the old Celts had little or no humour is that the reading of Irish history suggests it, and people may perhaps be forgiven for presuming it to be impossible to preserve humour under the doleful circumstances recorded by historians. And indeed if there was little to laugh at even before the English invasion, there was assuredly less after it. Life suddenly became tragic for the bards and the jesters. In place of the primitive amusements, the elementary pranks of the first ages, more serious matters were forced upon their attention, but appearances notwithstanding, the humorist thrived, and probably improved in the gloom overcasting the country; at any rate the innate good humour of the Irish re fused to be completely stifled or restricted. Personalities were not the most popular subjects for ridicule, and the most detested characters, though often attacked in real earnest, were not the favourite themes with the wits. Cromwell's name suggested a curse rather than a joke, and it is only your modems your Downeys and Frenches - who make a jest of him. It, being impossible to define humour or wit exactly, it is hardly wise to add another to the many failures attached to the attempt. But Irish humour, properly speaking, is, one may venture to say, more imaginative than any other. And it is probably less ill-natured than that of any other nation, though the Irish have a special aptness in the saying of things that wound, and the most illiterate of Irish peasants can put more scorn into a retort than the most highly educated of another race. There is sometimes a half-pathetic strain in the best Irish humorous writers, and just as in their saddest moments the people are inclined to joke, so in many writings where pathos predominates, the native humour gleams. If true Irish humour is not easily defined with precision, it is at least easily recognisable, there is so much buoyancy and movement in it, and usually so much expansion of heart. An eminent French. About the Publisher Forgotten Books publishes hundreds of thousands of rare and classic books. Find more at www.forgottenbooks.com This book is a reproduction of an important historical work. Forgotten Books uses state-of-the-art technology to digitally reconstruct the work, preserving the original format whilst repairing imperfections present in the aged copy. In rare cases, an imperfection in the original, such as a blemish or missing page, may be replicated in our edition. We do, however, repair the vast majority of imperfections successfully; any imperfections that remain are intentionally left to preserve the state of such historical works.