LOOKBACK: This article was first published this day last year
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The Sandymount Hotel in Dublin played host to an event on Friday morning to remember the late Desmond Fennell who died in 2021 and to hear a number of presentations on his life and work.
One of the organisers of the seminar – entitled Desmond Fennell and Ireland: Past, Present and Future – Dr. Finbarr Bradley spoke to Gript about the day.
In his introduction, Dr. Bradley had referred to the irony of the gathering taking place in the heart of “D4” given Fennell’s lifelong dissent from the received wisdoms of the Dublin liberal elite which is often associated with that postal code.
In some ways, Fennell consciously chose to be a “heretic” and a “dissident” but part of that was undoubtedly forced upon him by his gradual marginalisation by an elite which itself consciously made the decision, from the 1970s onwards, to actively exclude such voices from the public discourse.
Although Section 31 was not specifically referred to, much of the “closing of the Irish mind” – to coin a phrase from Allan Bloom – was a consequence of the outworkings of the broadcasting restrictions on those known to be members of Provisional Sinn Féin. Fennell was associated with the same for a time as one of those attracted to the Éire Nua concept of a radically decentralised federation of regions and communities.
The state censorship was internalised and radically extended to exclude not only anything that might be considered “hush puppy Provoism” but also anyone or any body of work or cultural expression that was identified by the liberal bourgeoisie and Workers Party left as upholding any of the values of a “backward nationalist, priest ridden” Ireland that they were intent on dismantling.
Fennell stood and stands for an intellectual refusal to accept the “party line”, but it is also apparent that he was the voice of an instinctive grassroots rejection of their project, which – while seemingly isolated and declared ad nauseum to be dead in the water – is still clearly, as evidenced by some of the referendum results, not as dead as its relentless enemies might wish to believe.
This is evident in the attraction which Fennell’s impressive body of writing has on a younger generation of intellectuals and activists. That was clearly present at the seminar and appeared to be much appreciated by members of the Fennell family, who attended and who spoke during the seminar, and later when participants mingled in a more informal and relaxed setting over lunch.
That younger generation was represented by the first speaker, James Bradshaw, who has set himself the task of selecting from the written works for publication to meet the demand for the writings of Desmond Fennell which can be difficult to locate. Bradshaw summarised the central theme of the writings between 1959 and 2017 as having been centred on Fennell’s “core social and political objective in completing the Irish Revolution.”
I will be returning to an examination of this along with all of the other contributions in more detail and wish here to provide just a flavour of the day. Part of the personal flavour was provided by Kate Fennell in her fascinating and often amusing and moving insight into what Fennell was like as a father and as a man.
The Fennells had transplanted themselves into the Conamara Gaeltacht in the 1960s as a part of Desmond’s commitment to building at micro level the community of communities which he envisaged as forming the bedrock of the revolution. A commitment that he theorised in his writings on aspects of federalism and in practical terms as it was attempted to be given manifestation through the structures set out in the Éire Nua policy.
Kate also spoke of their being given their dinners while ensconced in barrels, and of some of the other idiosyncrasies of a man who while clearly dearly beloved of those who knew him, could also be at a times an awkward cuss, it seems. Another daughter, Sorcha, spoke from the floor and mentioned the contradiction that she herself recognised in Fennell’s basic notions of individual freedom and thought in a communitarian context with his sometime admiration for Mao and other “strong men.”
Toner Quinn, son of filmmaker Bob Quinn, whose family followed the Fennells to Conamara, provided a fascinating insight into his own experience of publishing Fennell’s writings, and the difficulty he had in finding mainstream publishers, and hence his resort at times to self publication.
Six of Fennell’s books were self-published from the 1980s onwards as the mainstream became increasingly closed off to him. Toner placed this also in the context of the “Irish problem with thought.” He also noted that much of the domestic nonfiction market is driven by broadcast celebrity, which by its nature tends to be of a more frivolous nature than the sort of public discourse that one might find in France and other European countries.
This latter point is tangentially related to what Professor Jerry White, apropos of a comment made by De Valera to Charles de Gaulle about England being a “screen between Ireland and Europe”, regarding Fennell’s place in a broader European milieu. That “screen” is much more an inhibitor given that the lingua franca, as it were, of public discourse here is overwhelmingly English.
White also spoke to Fennell having been drawn to the notion of a “Europe of a hundred flags” comprised of mono lingual communities including places like the Faeroes – which Fennell regarded as a model for what he wanted to see here both economically and culturally – as well as the Irish speaking communities whose expansion he envisaged and places such as Brittany, Wales and so on.
Angela Nagle referred to Fennell as exemplifying what is increasingly evident to be a tenuous and indeed politically irrelevant distinction between Right and Left. A notion that we will certainly be returning to shortly in the context of global and Irish developments.
The formal part of the proceedings concluded with contributions from a panel of participants who included David Quinn of the Irish Catholic, Cillian Fennell, and young Fennell enthusiast Aaron Richardson who fielded questions regarding Fennell’s relevance to public discourse today and over the coming years.
As I said, I intend to return to this and hopefully the commitment of most of those present to taking this to a new level where Desmond Fennell and his writings, and the interaction of those influenced by him and working in the same areas will bear even greater fruit in the near future.
Tá géarghá le níos mó ná diúltú an liobrálachais fholamh. Tá traidisiún saibhir smaointeoireachta againn atá fréamhaithe inár stair, agus tá Desmond Fennell i gcroílár an traidisiún fealsúnachta sin. Caithfimid brú ar aghaidh leis an aisling sin a chur i gcroílár an dioscúrsa poiblí.