Bit of a Writer

Born on 9 February 1923, Brendan Behan was raised at 13 Russell Street in Dublin’s north inner city. He became one of Ireland’s best-known writers and talkers. Behan moved between Dublin, Kerry and Connemara and spent time in Paris, writing in both Irish and English. He wrote articles for The Irish Press and two radio plays for Radio Éireann.‘The Quare Fellow’, Behan’s first play, was produced in 1954 in Dublin. ‘The Hostage’ met with great success internationally following Joan Littlewood’s production in London in 1958. Borstal Boy, Behan’s autobiographical novel, was published the same year and became an immediate best seller. Suffering from diabetes, compounded by years of heavy drinking, he died on 20 March 1964. Professor John Brannigan is Head of English at UCD and is the author of book-length studies of the writings of Brendan Behan and Pat Barker as well as investigations of critical race theory in Race in Modern Irish Literature and Culture (2009). He was editor of the international journal Irish University Review from 2010 to 2016.

‘Fascinating reading. It is obviously a labour of love and a work of deep academic research by its editor, Professor John Brannigan, head of English at UCD. He has not only compiled the articles but annotated them with extensive footnotes to explain their numerous references so that we can “enjoy Behan in his own time”. Brannigan’s 33 pages of notes gives us the societal context in which Behan was writing and catches his irreverence [in these] discursive, engaging and sometimes fantastical columns. Behan’s columns gathered here, written in haste and mischievousness to earn money, give readers a more anarchic Dublin while also taking us on excursions across Ireland and to his beloved Paris. They show an apprentice writer, vibrantly in love with words – and with no idea where those words would lead him in the few short years to come.’ Dermot Bolger, Sunday Business Post