Coolaney is a small village on the southern slopes of the Ox Mountains in County Sligo. I was born in the the parish and wrote a short history of the parish and published it in 1985.
The population of the area increased enormously during the tiger years and the village regularly comes out on top in Sligo in the Tidy Towns competition.
The local committee have just finished a major renovation of the Community Centre in the village and it is being re-opened this Friday, 24 May. I was asked to do a talk on the history of the village on Saturday evening 25th. I was delighted and decided to call it A History of Coolaney in 15 Objects, reflecting a current trend in such things.
Most of the 15 objects are in museums or libraries but I will have six or seven actual objects with me on the evening including the one pictured above. More on the night. I'm looking forward to the event and hope I do the occasion justice.
The well-known Book of O'Hara which contains 37 bardic poems of the late sixteenth century was compiled in honour of Cormac O'Hara, head of the family who lived in Coolaney and died in 1612. Some of these poems were written by the poet, Tadhg Dall O'Higgins, born close by near Achonry.
And of course five of my poems about the area, including one called Coolaney, were published in an anthology, Imagination and Place: Cartography, in Kansas, USA earlier this year.
And you are working on, or have already done a set of poems on them too, haven't you? ;)
ReplyDeleteYes Barbara I've a set of poems about the area. Some were published as a chapbook "The Hawk's Rock" to accompany an exhibition by Sligo artist Conor Gallagher in 2010. Four have been published in the Kansas anthology.
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