Padraig O Fathaigh ( 1879-1976) was a lifelong Gaelic Leaguer and teacher of Irish. Already a prominent member of the Irish Republican Brotherhood and the Irish Volunteers before 1916, O Fathaigh was arrested on Easter Tuesday before he could join forces with Liam Mellows. He spent the next year undergoing penal servitude, the first of four terms of imprisonment between 1916 and 1920. When at liberty he acted as an intelligence officer in South Galway and Mid-Clare, taking part in some minor ambushes. His detailed and thoughtful handwritten recollections of life - on the run- and in prison...

In this groundbreaking work, Timothy McMahon reexamines the significance of the Gaelic Revival in forming Ireland's national identity. United in their determination to preserve and extend the use of Irish as a spoken language and artistic medium, members of the Gaelic League profoundly influenced Irish culture and literature in the twentieth century. McMahon explores that influence by scrutinizing the ways in which society absorbed their leaders' messages, tracing the interaction between the ideas propagated by the League and the variety of meanings ordinary people attached to Ireland and to...