A literary tour
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Literary pilgrimages achieve two ends. Firstly, they explain much of how the writers saw the world and how the landscape influenced their writing. Secondly, they take the pilgrim into wonderful places that might otherwise have been missed. This tour of Brilliant Ireland covers three regions: Sligo and Leitrim for W B Yeats and John McGahern; Donegal, Fermanagh and Tyrone for Richard Allingham, William Carleton, Benedict Kiely and Peadar O'Donnell; Derry/Londonderry for Brian Friel, Seamus Heaney and Jennifer Johnston with Antrim and Monaghan for Louis McNeice and Patrick Kavanagh. For a delightful and scholarly background to your literary tour, consult the book Elizabeth Healy's Literary Tour of Ireland, published in Dublin by Wolfhound Press.
Give yourself at least two days for each of the three sections of the tour.
Sligo and Leitrim
365 km
County Sligo existed for centuries before the birth of W B Yeats in Dublin in 1865. So he did not actually invent it. But his grandparents lived and worked in the county and the poet spent long and happy holidays with his relations there throughout his young days. He adopted Sligo as his spiritual home and Sligo has honoured him for decades. Pubs and hotels are named after Yeats and, much more importantly, signposts all over the county, and its neighbouring Leitrim, show the way to places, large and small, whose names, legends and landscapes he used in his poetry.
Sligo is accessible from Knock Airport or by a good, fast road from Dublin. Sligo town and its surrounding country, with seaside and lakes, make a convenient base, with plenty of accommodation and good food. A lovely lake drive heads eastwards by the shores of Lough Gill and signposts to the Lake Isle of Innisfree, the inspiration of one of Yeats's best-known and most beautiful poems. Then the road crosses the county border to Leitrim and Dromahair, a village which figures in many of the poems.
From Dromahair our route goes to the south-east, along the shores of the great Lough Allen to the boating centre of Carrick-on-Shannon. A diversion into County Roscommon allows visits to Keadew and Cootehall. Turlough O'Carolan, last and greatest of the Irish bards, lies buried at Keadew, while in the lakeside village of Cootehall, John McGahern spent his early years in the police station where his father was the senior officer. He would move to Dublin and become known as one of Ireland's finest modern novelists. East of Carrick is Mohill, which became famous as his home for the last twenty years of his life. There he lived and worked on a small farm beside a lake until shortly before his death in the spring of 2006.
The route returns to Sligo along the east shore of Lough Allen, beneath the Iron Mountains, to Manorhamilton and back to the Yeats Country, through the magical valley of Glencar to Drumcliff Churchyard, in the shade of the precipitous Ben Bulben, and the grave of Yeats in the old churchyard.
Donegal, Fermanagh and Tyrone
590 km
From Sligo the route goes northwards for Ballyshannon and Donegal town. Before leaving County Sligo, make a diversion to Lissadell, the seaside home of the 'rebel countess' Constance Markievicz and a favourite haunt of Yeats. The magnificent mountains of the Ben Bulben range fall away to the lowlands of south Donegal and the town of Ballyshannon, which climbs up the steep sides of the valley of the River Erne. On the bridge there is a stone tablet commemorating the poet William Allingham, who is buried in the beautiful churchyard on the top of the hill. Born and reared in the town, he moved to London and came to be numbered amongst the leading poets of the late19th century. One of his most famous poems begins with the words 'Along the winding banks of Erne' and we will follow that river and its lakes after going northwards to Donegal town and the Rosses. The modern church in the town commemorates the work of the 'Four Masters'. Scholarly Franciscan friars, these men began in 1632 to compile a history of Ireland from the beginning of the world to their own times. They completed it by the seaside in Donegal Abbey four years later, a compilation of heroic size, copied from ancient manuscripts, most of which have disappeared since their times.
Farther north, in a lovely low-lying region of lakes on the land and islands on the sea, is Menmore, near the thriving town of Dungloe, where the writer and social reformer Peadar O'Donnell was born. Often in serious trouble with the authorities for his radical views, he wrote beautiful stories about life in the not too distant past in one of the most remote parts of Ireland.
After returning to Donegal town, make your way to Pettigo and access to the remote mountain lake called Lough Derg, a sacred place still visited by thousands of pilgrims, more than fifteen hundred years since St. Patrick kept vigil there. South of Pettigo is the great expanse of Lower Lough Erne and its Boa Island, where one of Ireland's very few stone idols from pre-Christian times may be seen. Not far away, at the gate of Castlecaldwell, stands a fiddle, sculptured in stone and bearing a poem in commemoration of the fate of the musician Denis McCabe, drowned in the lake nearby, two hundred years ago.
Follow the Erne to Enniskillen and go east to the broad, spacious, fertile Clogher Valley. There, in the 19th century, the very remarkable novelist and social observer William Carleton was born and reared. His neat, thatched cottage home is preserved as a memorial to the man and his writings. A later man to celebrate the Clogher Valley is the poet John Montague.
Then go north to the town of Omagh, birthplace of Benedict Kiely, marvellous raconteur and writer of many fine novels, travelogues and literary criticism. Many of his tales are set in the surrounding country, including the beautiful Gortin Glen nearby. Kiely's first book was a biography of Carleton.
From Omagh, go north for Derry city, and be sure to visit the Ulster American Folk Park on the way. Its exhibits tell the story of the generations of Ulster men and women who left their native land ins search of a better life in North America - and who made a major contribution to the prosperity of the United States and of Canada.
Derry, Antrim and Monaghan
610 km
'Derry' in Irish means an oak grove and, in pagan times, there was a sacred grove on the hilltop overlooking Lough Foyle. St. Colmcille, from the neighbouring county of Donegal, established a monastery there in the 6th century. He was a scholar, poet and diplomat and the first of many writers to have a connection with the spot. English settlers re-named the place Londonderry, built a new cathedral and the walls that still surround the old town. Derry is peaceful now and the home or birthplace of writers who have established international reputations. They include Brian Friel, whose play The freedom of the city is set in modern Derry and George Farquhar who moved to London in the 17th century. The novelist Jennifer Johnston, a Dubliner, has lived there for many years and Frank McGuinness, from nearby Buncrana in Co. Donegal, has set some of his plays in the city. The wife of a 19th century Bishop of Derry, Mrs C F Alexander, may not have been the greatest of poets but her hymns are amongst the best loved of any in the English language: Once in Royal David's City, All things bright and beautiful and many others were written and first heard in the old city.
Go west for Limavady where a song collector named Jane Ross wrote down a tune she heard a fiddler playing. She never met the man, nor discovered his name but the tune became known as the Londonderry Air and one of the most popular of all melodies ever to composed in Ireland. Drive to the coast at Coleraine and, having got that far, don't miss the marvellous coast road from Portrush to the Giant's Causeway. Even though it may have no specific chronicler, a great many writers and artists have recorded their views of the unique scenery. Then head southwards through the valley of the River Bann, the country of Seamus Heaney. At Toome you will see the great fishery for eels that he celebrated in more than one poem. Toome marks the outflow of Lough Neagh, far and away the largest lake in Ireland.
West from Toome, the road leads through Antrim town to Belfast Lough and the old harbour of Carrickfergus, dominated by its castle built of black basalt, the volcanic rock that covers the greater part of the County Antrim and explains its spectacular scenery. Louis McNeice, born in Belfast, was brought up by his father in the rectory of Carrickfergus.
Our journey ends in Co. Monaghan, which you can approach in two ways: a more direct one through Belfast and Armagh or one with marvellous scenery through the Mountains of Mourne - celebrated in song by Percy French and the region where the father of the Brönte sisters learned the art of story-telling from his father. The chief destination in Co. Monaghan is Inniskeen, birthplace and burial place of the poet Patrick Kavanagh. He left the small and inward-looking farming community there for the more stimulating world of Dublin's fair city - but much of his finest writing tells of the joys and trials of rural life in a recent, but utterly bygone age. Kavanagh's life and times are commemorated in the old church there, converted to a museum in his honour.
Inniskeen is situated midway between Belfast and Dublin, with their airports and ferry ports - to say nothing of their museums, universities and innumerable writers - within a couple of hours' journey.
FURTHER INFORMATION
For further information on any of the items featured above, or on the counties in general, please contact:
Fáilte Ireland North West
Aras Reddan
Temple Street
Sligo
Tel: 00353 (0) 7191 61201
Fax: 00353 (0) 719160360
Email: northwestinfo@failteireland.ie
Web: www.irelandnorthwest.ie
Fermanagh Lakeland Tourism
Fermanagh Tourist Information Centre
Wellington Road
Enniskillen
BT74 7EF
Northern Ireland
Tel: 0044 (0) 28 6632 3110
Fax: 0044 (0) 28 6632 5511
Email: info@fermanaghlakelands.com
Web: www.findfermanagh.com
Derry Visitor and Convention Bureau
44 Foyle Street
Derry
BT48 6TE
Northern Ireland
Tel: 0044 (0) 28 7137 7577
Fax: 0044 (0) 28 7137 7992
Email: info@derryvisitor.com
Web: www.derryvisitor.com
Causeway Coast & Glens
11 Lodge Road
Coleraine
BT52 1LU
Northern Ireland
Tel: 0044 (0) 28 7032 7720
Fax:0044 (0) 28 7032 7719
Email: mail@causewaycoastandglens.com
Web: www.causewaycoastandglens.com
Flavour of Tyrone
Killymaddy Tourist Information Centre
190 Ballygawley Road
Dungannon
Co. Tyrone BT70 1TF
Tel: 0044 (0)28 8776 7259
Fax: 0044 (0)28 8776 7911
Email: info@flavouroftyrone.com
Web: www.flavouroftyrone.com
Sperrins Tourism Ltd
The Manor House
30 High Street
Moneymore
BT70 45 7PD
Tel: 0044 (0)28 8674 7700
Fax: 0044 (0) 28 8674 7754
Email: info@sperrinstourism.com
Web: www.SperrinsTourism.com
