The Islandman

“Tomas O’Crohan’s sole purpose in writing The Islandman was, in his own words, ’to set down the character of the people about me so that some record of us might live after us, for the like of us will never be again.’

He was born on the Great Blasket Island in 1865 and died there in 1937, a great master of his native Irish, which he taught to scholars who came to see him from many countries.

He shared to the full the dangerous life of a primitive community, often stormbound, going hungry when the fish or the crops failed, living wel when the storm drove a wrecked cargo up the strand, and was a highly respected figure on the Island.  However he possessed a shrewd and humorous detachment from the whirlwind of everyday crisis which enabled him to observe and describe his world. His book was published in Gaelic, and subsequently in English, translated by Robin Flower, during his lifetime, and is an absorbing narrative of this life, written by one who had known no other.”