There were a few things that I wanted to do in Ireland. I was, however, sharing a cottage and a rental car with three other lovely people. And it was for this reason that I was not going to make it to Dublin from our love nest in the Rosses of Donegal, and I was not going to get to meet two fairly recent heroes of mine.Emails and Facebook messages had flown back and forth, as well as the occasional text once I was across the pond. Will u b able 2 get away from Dublin n spend an eve in Belfast? One was working; the other didn’t have a car. What r the chances that u’ll b in Galway 4 the western Ireland pridefest? Again, work—although one of them held out the possibility to the very end. In that end, however, he was far too busy with a project that deserves your attention and mine. It is because of this project that he IS one of my newest heroes.
Somhairle
Samuel Marr was first made known to me as Somhairle, a rough, traditionally Celtic equivalent to his given name. A longtime friend—also an Irish-Gaelic speaker—had emailed me a link to this man’s blog, seeming of interest to the both of us. The site was soon bookmarked and I resolved that I was going to follow his postings to improve my Irish.
“Ná déan sin!” Somhairle (pron. SO-war-leh) had written me in slightly-mock horror. “I’m still practically a learner myself! I’ll mess you up.” Stubborn, I did it ar aon nós and came to see a young man of great intelligence, drive, compassion—a serious man with high ideals and strong cultural identity, yet who enjoyed the craic with his mates, had a good sense of humo(u)r, and had the inner strength to wrestle not only with the furthering of his education (despite yanked funding), but with being a member of not one but TWO oft-derided minorities.
One day I revved up the computer, clicked Somhairle on the favorites list—and found nothing. The site had been abandoned. Had he not paid up? Was a faulty server not re-routing me to the right page? Had an international cataclysm, a tectonic disaster somewhere on the floor of the Atlantic caused my DSL to not recognize his text and images? Try and try again, I couldn’t pull it up…and I was moving…and I was planning a wedding…and changing careers. So Somhairle was abandoned for the moment, and I resolved to try again in a couple of months.
‘I am the Abomination’
A Facebook poke and a message later and I was back on track. Somhairle informed me that he was clueless to the problem, so I chalked the disaster up to the sub-Atlantic eruption and headed for his URL. At first I thought it again to be a mistake. What I found was a show reel including a parts of a trailer for what had been his baby in the months previous, and which will be airing this very weekend on an Irish national network.
‘Mise an tUafás.’ The word uafás can be translated a few different ways, and none of them should ever apply to anyone but the hateful and the cruel of our ever-shrinking world. “Horror”, “fright”, “terror”; in its adjective form uafásach can mean any of these with an “-ible” or
“-ening”, but what Somhairle was answering to most specifically in the title of his documentary is a refrain of religious conservatives in his own land and, sadly, across our own, namely that homosexuality is an ‘abomination’. Somhairle, in a passionate yet steady, proud yet not angry act of acceptance and defiance, utters these words and claims for himself, “I am the Abomination.”
Some may recall a rather famous poem, learned by just about every Irish student and by a great number of her scattered descendents, by the title “Mise Éire”—“I am Ireland”. Written by the poet and political activist Pádraig Pearse (d. May 3, 1916) it is a passionate yet steady, proud yet not angry, act of defiance to colonial, imperial oppression. The poem is a short, pithy, prophecy-like utterance that claims for Ireland the myths of her past, the reality of her present, and hope for her future as a nation yearning for self. A documentary put out by Seán Ó Riada in 1959 on Irish revolutionary nationalism bears the same title. Somhairle’s documentary seems like it will deal with revolutionary self-governance of a different stripe.
The documentary ‘Mise an t-Uafás' premiers this Sunday, August 30 at 4:30pm EST (9:30pm Dublin time) on the Irish network TG4. Most original programming for TG4 can be seen either live or archived on its website: http://www.tg4.com/. Click on 'TG4 BEO' (TG4 Live) in the header bar or go directly to http://www.tg4.com/scei/beo.asp and watch it in real time; or wait for the archive to be posted within hours of airing. To find the archive, look to the titles in green to the left of the TG4 BEO viewer pop-up. The latest programming is always nearest the top, and will be available either in the “Faisnéis”, “Siamsaíocht” or “Cláir Eile” sections. I myself will be waiting, and will let you know soon where it lands.
Somhairle’s professional and contact information, as well as his first showreel, can be found at his site: http://somhairle.me/ (a simple Google search for ‘Samuel Marr’ and ‘Blog Award’ will pull him up first off). Go directly to the trailer for the documentary at: http://www.youtube.com/user/somhairle.
Not only is the documentary pivotal for being an exposing view of the prejudices against/struggles of homosexuals on the Emerald Isle (traditionally resistant to change of any kind, decidedly skeptical) but it also showcases the younger, more energetic face of the current Celtic Renaissance. Somhairle being an active player in Irish-language revival, the interviews, narrations and news clips within the documentary alternate between English and Irish. There are easily-read subtitles in English for the Irish sections. Viewing the documentary will grant you insight not only into a sexual minority’s work for acceptance within Hibernian society, but also into the growing acceptance of the Irish language: its status is quickly moving from being the language of crusty academics and the marginal, west-coast poor of a former generation, to a modern medium of artistic, political and ideological confluence. Two generations of eye-rolling due to the terrible educational methods that accompanied hopes for language revival in a newly independent Ireland are now finding the language embraced by the most talented young people in the Four Provinces.
Somhairle brings to the screen a vibrant bilingualism and a liberating, level-headed defiance. See it played out for yourselves.
Some may recall a rather famous poem, learned by just about every Irish student and by a great number of her scattered descendents, by the title “Mise Éire”—“I am Ireland”. Written by the poet and political activist Pádraig Pearse (d. May 3, 1916) it is a passionate yet steady, proud yet not angry, act of defiance to colonial, imperial oppression. The poem is a short, pithy, prophecy-like utterance that claims for Ireland the myths of her past, the reality of her present, and hope for her future as a nation yearning for self. A documentary put out by Seán Ó Riada in 1959 on Irish revolutionary nationalism bears the same title. Somhairle’s documentary seems like it will deal with revolutionary self-governance of a different stripe.
The documentary ‘Mise an t-Uafás' premiers this Sunday, August 30 at 4:30pm EST (9:30pm Dublin time) on the Irish network TG4. Most original programming for TG4 can be seen either live or archived on its website: http://www.tg4.com/. Click on 'TG4 BEO' (TG4 Live) in the header bar or go directly to http://www.tg4.com/scei/beo.asp and watch it in real time; or wait for the archive to be posted within hours of airing. To find the archive, look to the titles in green to the left of the TG4 BEO viewer pop-up. The latest programming is always nearest the top, and will be available either in the “Faisnéis”, “Siamsaíocht” or “Cláir Eile” sections. I myself will be waiting, and will let you know soon where it lands.
Somhairle’s professional and contact information, as well as his first showreel, can be found at his site: http://somhairle.me/ (a simple Google search for ‘Samuel Marr’ and ‘Blog Award’ will pull him up first off). Go directly to the trailer for the documentary at: http://www.youtube.com/user/somhairle.
Not only is the documentary pivotal for being an exposing view of the prejudices against/struggles of homosexuals on the Emerald Isle (traditionally resistant to change of any kind, decidedly skeptical) but it also showcases the younger, more energetic face of the current Celtic Renaissance. Somhairle being an active player in Irish-language revival, the interviews, narrations and news clips within the documentary alternate between English and Irish. There are easily-read subtitles in English for the Irish sections. Viewing the documentary will grant you insight not only into a sexual minority’s work for acceptance within Hibernian society, but also into the growing acceptance of the Irish language: its status is quickly moving from being the language of crusty academics and the marginal, west-coast poor of a former generation, to a modern medium of artistic, political and ideological confluence. Two generations of eye-rolling due to the terrible educational methods that accompanied hopes for language revival in a newly independent Ireland are now finding the language embraced by the most talented young people in the Four Provinces.
Somhairle brings to the screen a vibrant bilingualism and a liberating, level-headed defiance. See it played out for yourselves.
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