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Mary O'Donoghue was the winner of the Hennessy
/ Sunday Tribune First Fiction Award and the
overall New Irish Writing Award
for 2001.
Mary
O'Donoghue's debut collection introduces a remarkable
new voice in Irish poetry. The range of that voice is matched
by the integrity of tone and feeling which is evident throughout.
The poems move easily from classical mythology and biblical
references to contemporary street-talk with no diminution
of rhetorical conviction. Like the character in 'Jezebel's
Palms', O'Donoghue gets under the skin of the female characters
whose disturbed lives she gives voice to with empathy and
unflinching candour. She articulates the wit and suffering
of the witches, gurners, saints and vestals and others who
inhabit these poems in language that bristles like backbrushed
velvet." Louis de Paor
"From the ancient
limestone of her native Clare to classical mythology and Irish folklore,
Mary O'Donoghue ranges far and wide to unearth her sources. Her work is
driven by an elegant sense of form and by a cool, subversive attitude.
Tulle is an luminous first book which will leap from its pages and devour
you." Eamonn Wall
About the Author
 Mary
O'Donoghue is from County Clare. Born in 1975, she is
a graduate of the Irish Studies programme at NUI Galway.
Her poetry has appeared in Poetry Ireland Review, Books
Ireland, The Shop and other journals. She has written for
The Sunday Business Post, The Bloomsday Review and aspects
of her research into 1890s Irish women's writing appear
in the critical anthology, New Voices in Irish Criticism.
She has recently begun to write fiction, and has been published
in The Sunday Tribune. In April 2000, Mary O'Donoghue was
the recipient of the Sean Dunne Young Writer Award. This
collection was the winner of the inaugural Salmon Poetry
Publication Prize.
Some
Poems from Tulle
The
Textures
For John C
I
am velvet.
Smooth nap,
But rub me up
The wrong way
And I bristle,
Growing hackles
Beneath your palms.
I
am moire.
Metallic skin,
But scan me
Under lamplight,
See silk
Shot through
With routes of tears.
I
am tulle.
Lively bustle,
But gather me
Between your hands,
I rustle,
Murmur,
Settle.
St.
Christina the Astonishing
The
windows steamed over with grief
Exhaled from a chockful church.
Men
at the back,
Fists ensconced in pockets,
Harrumphed clear their throats.
Women
loosened bonnet ribbands,
Blubbed and snotted
Into cologned handkerchiefs.
Toddlers
took refuge
In serge skirt folds
And wauled their contribution.
The
woman aboard the bier
Stirred, sat up, strutted by her elbows,
Wiggled out a hair-pin
From her coffin coiff
And clipped her nostrils shut.
She
spoke in a sinusitis voice
To her muggy troupe of mourners:
“Ye
folks have got to end
This dependence on garlic
To flavour the cooking,
Neutralise bee-stings
And quash gumboils and carbuncles”.
A
Review of TULLE
from: New Hibernia Review, Autumn 2001
Born
in 1975 in County Clare, poet Mary O'Donoghue won the first
Salmon Poetry Publication Prize in 2000. The result is Tulle,
which augurs well for both the poet and the award.
At first, a reader might be put off by O'Donoghue's not
infrequent references to blood and guts, "arsehole", and
bodily functions. As we say in America, this is a
young poet "feeling her oats", expressing the unevenness
of life but also its recurrent beauties, whether it be in
the opening poem "Widening the Canal" or a fuller expostulation
wherein the book's title derives. Consider the opening short
poem with its implicit feminism and remarkable use of imagery,
"Widening the Canal":
The
oldest girl is ground-breaker
For all the girls who follow after.
Her birth takes a bit longer:
She widens the canal. Makes it stronger.
The
youngest sister slips through quickest.
The canal is its broadest, she is the littlest.
Plenty of room to wriggle and slither,
Jerking her safety rope along the route with her.
The
title of the collection, "Tulle" comes from "The Textures."
The word "tulle" names a fabric used in the making of veils,
evening dresses, and ballet costumes -- and in this, O'Donoghue
has built a durable, sinewy poem. Here is the entirety of
"The Textures":
I
am velvet.
Smoth nap,
But rub me up
The wrong way
And I bristle,
Growing hackles
Beneath your palms.
I
am moire.
Mettalic skin,
But scan me
Under lamplight,
See silk
Shot through
With routes of tears.
I
am tulle.
Lively bustle,
But gather me
Between your hans,
I rustle,
Murmur,
Settle.
To
her credit, O'Donoghue is not a poet to ignore the tragedies
of life nor recurrent unpleasantness. She knows history,
especially the history of the arts and its significant figures
-- such as the early death of Modigliani in January, 1920
in Paris, and the suicide the next day of his pregnant lover.
Here are the final lines of "Jeanne Hebuterne":
The
day after he choked
And fell still,
Five floors between me
And the street,
With our baby romping inside me,
Not knowing her next kick
Will topple me into the air.
Her eight-month-three-week
Weight will suck me quicker
To the ground.
Other
fine poems were written for and about O'Donoghue's family
members. In the latter category, I recommend "Potato Cakes",
"Stroke", and "Sprockets." Mary O'Donoghue is a young
poet of immense talent and vision. O'Donoghue is not all
serious business. She can be playful and funny at times,
as in the second of four elongated strophes in "The She-Machines",
but her concerns range from love to war to past tragedies
to the heartlessness of what can go on far beyond
a poet's ken, but always within purview. Tulle is a vibrant
collection of toughly hewn poems. JAMES
NAIDEN, New Hibernia Review, Autumn 2001
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