An audiodrama for fans of Motherfoclóir! The Greatest Matter is a new gothic crime tale set in Victorian Dublin, about a criminologist who arrives in the city and gets caught up in a murder investigation with occult connections. It's a full-cast audiodrama, with a cast of great Irish actors, immersive sound design and original music. Have a listen to Ep 1 here, and all 12 episodes are available to listen to in full right now - just type The Greatest Matter into whatever player you're using now, ...
Dec 20, 2024•40 min
We're back! Well, sort of. In March 2024 Darach, Gearóidín and Peadar were reunited for a live Seachtain na Gaeilge event in Clondalkin Library (a home advantage for Peadar!) On the occasion of the anniversary of Brendan Behan's death, the gang discussed the controversy surrounding the English translation of his Irish language play An Giall: did Behan approve of this version, and the significant differences in the text? This leads to a discussion of translating Hiberno English and Irish locals c...
Sep 24, 2024•53 min
With thanks to the Bram Stoker Festival, the Motherfoclóir Podcast was resurrected for one afternoon in October 2022 to discuss the translation of Dracula into Irish by Seán Ó Cuirreáin. In this recording of last year's live show Darach is joined by Peadar and Siún as they consider the different motives of the politicians who commissioned the translation and the writer asked to carry out the work. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices
Oct 27, 2023•1 hr 5 min
Motherfocloir is part of the HeadStuff Podcast Network and there are lots of other shows on the network we think you might like. Words To That Effect is a show that tells stories of the fiction behind popular culture and if you're a fan of Motherfocloir we think there's a very good chance you'll like this show too. Here's a full episode, all about the history of dragons in fiction and popular culture. Enjoy! For more, and all the eps of Words To That Effect, go to HeadStuffPodcasts.com Learn mor...
Mar 14, 2022•33 min
Thank you for your support over the last four years. Thank you for inviting us into your headphones and into your head. We hope you enjoyed it as much as we did. Thank you to Brian and Kirsten for making each episode look and sound amazing. Thank you to Éimear, Clodagh, Caitlín, Siún and Ola, and all the members of the extended Motherfoclóir family. Thank you to our guests for teaching us so much. Much love to anyone who sent us messages of encouragement. Go raibh míle maith agaibh. --- Get Kirs...
Sep 02, 2021•1 hr 33 min•Ep. 186
If you follow Darach's Word of the Week project with the Irish Arts Center in New York, you'll have seen the artwork of Amy Louise O'Callaghan - @amylouioc on Twitter, Instagram and Etsy - who reimagines Irish mythology in the style of Japanese animation house Studio Ghibli. More recently she has reimagined the iconography of tarot cards using well-known tales and characters from Irish mythology. She chats to Darach about her influences, her work process, her interest in Japan and her favourite ...
Aug 28, 2021•37 min
Join us for the final episode of Motherfoclóir, live on Zoom tonight: https://www.patreon.com/posts/55377967 --- Every artistic/visual representation of Cúchulainn presents him as a hulking, ultra-masculine figure. But is this interpretation justified by the text? In the Táin, Cúchulainn is frequently described as a small lad, girly in some ways, a person who has to change his appearance to present as a "normal man" but does not wear this disguise when he does not have to. In today's episode of ...
Aug 26, 2021•50 min•Ep. 185
The re-release of Professor Terence Dolan's Dictionary of Hiberno-English didn't happen by accident, but was nudged into existence by a writer who also happens to be one of the most seminal and relevant voices in Irish podcasting. And he's our guest this week! Before we folded the podcast forever, we are delighted to bring you this conversation between Darach and Blindboy Boatclub, one half of the Rubber bandits and author of two collections of short stories. Blindboy talks to Darach about the D...
Aug 19, 2021•1 hr 12 min•Ep. 184
In terms of literary prestige, romance novels don't get no respect, ranking lower than sports biographies and screenplay novelisations on the scale of respectability - according to people who don't read them, anyway. But what about people who do? Since Covid, sales of romance novels have shot through the roof, largely on account of the #BookTok hashtag on Tiktok. And one of #BookTok's stars joins us on today's episode. You might remember Róisín McNally from episode #122 - she's back to tell Dara...
Aug 12, 2021•59 min•Ep. 183
Four years ago we started this podcast off with a discussion of the letter V. There’s been much water under the bridge since then and while we always meant to give the other seven “forbidden” letters their own episode, there was always something a bit more urgent to attend to. Like translating smutty novels and so forth. But on today’s episode, Dr McEvoy and Mayor Pete assist Darach in a whistle stop tour of the letters J, K, Q, W, X, Y and Z. Where do they come from and what do they want? Can t...
Aug 05, 2021•59 min•Ep. 182
Everybody is talking about Twitter sensation Séamas Ó Reilly and his hilarious yet moving memoir "Did You Hear Mammy Died?" And rightly so - it's a sensational telling of a remarkable story of a boy with ten siblings losing his mother far too young and being reared by one of the most memorable Irish Dads in the history of memoir. Can a movie be far behind? Séamas didn't just appear out of nowhere, of course, and between his Rush Hour Crush skits, his infamous anti-capitalist satirical prank invo...
Jul 29, 2021•46 min•Ep. 181
When we say that a child is full of divilment, are we saying that they are possessed by Satan? No, we are not. In today's episode, Darach, Gearóidín and Peadar consider the concept of the devil in the Irish language. Why does diabhal scéal (devil a story) mean no story? What's the deal with the devil being buried in Killarney? Were politicians aware of the term Taoiseach An Bháis (Lord of Death) when the term Taoiseach was chosen to mean Irish Prime Minister? And with all these terms, how much w...
Jul 22, 2021•57 min•Ep. 180
Well, it couldn't last forever; Motherfoclóir will be ending forever before this autumn. Before we go on our separate ways, we'd like to bring you some topics and guests that we always meant to, but put on the long finger because we wanted "do more prep" or "wait until X was available" or some other excuse. Anyway, there's no time to procrastinate anymore… First up, our Gearóidín tells Darach all about her PhD thesis in advance of a viva. What's a viva? What's a thesis? We will explain. Gearóidí...
Jul 15, 2021•52 min•Ep. 179
Darach chats to Katy and Dominic, the hosts of popular podcast "The Europeans". To hear the full episode and much more visit https://www.patreon.com/darach The Europeans podcast can be found at https://europeanspodcast.com/ Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices
Jun 04, 2021•13 min
Darach is joined by Mira Adama (@LostWolfling), along with a cast of other contributors, to discuss a cult classic of Irish cinema. Watch Fatal Deviation here: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=IPne3Wh0lqk This is our last episode of the season! You can join us on Patreon for bonus content throughout the break. --- Support Motherfocloir on Patreon: https://www.patreon.com/darach Get Kirsten Shiel art prints here: https://www.inprnt.com/gallery/kirstenshiel/ --- Contact the show: whatsapp - +353894...
May 13, 2021•1 hr 4 min•Ep. 178
Recently, Yiddish became the fortieth language to join Duolingo, an achievement that followed hot on the heels of Harry Potter being translated into Yiddish. And would you believe that a brother and sister were responsible for these separate accomplishments? Well, when we found out about it we were struck by how many of the same kinds of conflicts and considerations that faced Irish came up again in thre context of Yiddish. So we had to find out more. On today’s episode, Darach chats with siblin...
May 06, 2021•48 min•Ep. 177
Watch this episode: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=jsORJSesv48 In 2017, Irish Sign Language (ISL) was officially given legal recognition in Ireland. Of course, it has a long history prior to this and in today's episode, Darach and Gearóidín meet Caroline McGrotty (@CarolineMcTweet), an ISL translator and presenter, to find out more. Where did ISL come from? Is it different in Northern Ireland? What is Caroline's favourite ISL word? Find out all this and more. ISL interpretation in this episode ...
May 05, 2021•47 min•Ep. 176
Jesus, Mary and Joseph and the Wee Donkey. Everyone is hooked on “Line of Duty” at the moment, the latest reinvention of the cop show genre - and, fittingly, a reinvention of the “Irish cop” trope which is even older than television. But why did this format - a legacy from the era of segregation and McCarthyism - survive when westerns, Elvis movies, and musicals either die off or get resurrected beyond recognition? More than any other part of the state, policing is understood in the context of p...
Apr 29, 2021•48 min•Ep. 175
When he’s not beavering away at this very podcast, Darach does a bit of work with the Irish Arts Center in New York as part of their word of the week project. This allows him to collaborate with some exciting and talented artists, such as today’s guest Louise Ní Chuilinn (as known as Selkies). Louise, an Irish speaker living in Brussels, tells Darach and Peadar about that city’s artistic scene, such as the bandes dessinées which French learners in Ireland love so well. She talks about her collab...
Apr 22, 2021•56 min•Ep. 174
There’s a song in the Mincéir tradition (made famous among settled audiences by Luke Kelly) called the 40 Foot Trailer which ends with the line “There's a bylaw to say you maun be on your way And another to say ye can't wander” The implication is clear: the Traveller Community are damned if they do and damned if they don’t. Despite the visibility of the Travelling Community in Irish life, in political pamphlets and bad-faith documentaries, the fact remains that the wider community in Ireland rem...
Apr 16, 2021•1 hr 11 min•Ep. 173
One of the finest new accounts to join Twitter during the pandemic has been @EnyaComments, a deceptively simple twitter handle that shares comments written under Enya videos on the YouTube.These range from the ridiculous to the sublime. But what is it about Enya that draws such a wide fanbase from around the world? Why do her fans feel such a close connection and associate her music with healing, grieving, solitude or mysticism? Why is she so big in Syria? And as for Enya Economics, what can we ...
Apr 08, 2021•47 min•Ep. 172
Every few weeks, a story goes viral in Ireland: a letter, addressed to someone like "that lady with the yellow baseball cap who owns a cat the size of a dog and a dog the size of a cat" is posted and finds its intended recipient. It's a tribute to the affection and esteem with which Irish people regard their postal service. It hints at one of a number of reasons why Ireland resisted postcodes for so long - because our postal workers had such deep local knowledge that they didn't need them. It's ...
Apr 02, 2021•56 min•Ep. 171
Are things holy because we need them or do we need them because they're holy? This is something that we consider on this week's episode when holy wells are discussed. Are the legends and myths about holy wells just a roundabout way of explaining what their purpose is? Why are there so many in Limerick? What does Ryan Tubridy's surname mean? We also discuss the theory that zombie movies are more popular under Republican presidents and vampire movies are more popular under the Democrats. Check out...
Mar 26, 2021•44 min•Ep. 170
Back in 2015, the Paris Review ran an article on Robert Frost’s poem, “The Road Not Taken” and concluded that it is - by some distance - the best known and most widely referenced poem of the twentieth century. Nothing else comes close. And yet, it is as misunderstood as it is famous. Many poems, or extracts from poems, are misread outside their original context - like Frost’s other line, “good fences make good neighbours” and Beckett’s “Fail Again, Fail Better”. And what of Irish poetry - are th...
Mar 19, 2021•56 min•Ep. 169
Whether it's Flann O'Brien, the Book of Kells, Dindsenchas or An tOileánach, the Irish literary and literary historical traditions respect the idea of the digression - the idea that knowledge information, truth itself does not respect the artificial categories that limited human minds try to trap them in. Just as crabs think that eels are flying because they don't understand the concept of water, humans do not always immediately understand the profound links between topics. But to set informatio...
Mar 12, 2021•57 min•Ep. 168
At the end of February, the CSO released the 2020 baby name statistics and after a long run, Emily is no longer the top girl name in Ireland. How should we interpret this? What does it mean for existing Emilys, especially the ones who rejoiced in the name before it became so popular in the noughties? Grace is the new top name, but how much of that is a global anglophone phenomenon and how much it is linked to its Irish associations - Grace Gifford and the song that bears her name, for example? A...
Mar 05, 2021•52 min•Ep. 167
Greetings agus Salutations, I am Motherfoclóir, prince of words, Irish, Irish words and words from Ireland. I have a very special request to make of you. If you listen to this podchraoladh about spam as Gaeilge, I will send twenty millionty squillion US Dollars in gold bullion into your earphones. Please send me your bank details by WhatsApp voice note to +353 89 478 4713 and tell me I'm pretty. Seriously, though. Don't answer spam emails. --- Support Motherfocloir on Patreon: https://www.patreo...
Feb 26, 2021•41 min•Ep. 166
In Thin Lizzy's tune Emerald, Phil Lynott tells a tale of marching men who wish to overthrow overlords, fighting a fight they believe to be right. But they bring horrible destruction in their pursuit of this goal - children never playing again, for example - as they seek The Emerald, a talisman not unlike Tolkien's ring. Lynott never explains what the Emerald is nor does he need to. The Emerald is intimately associated with Ireland, the Emerald Isle. But where did this name come from? Did Irelan...
Feb 19, 2021•50 min•Ep. 165
We've spoken about fairy forts before. However, in the context of our recent discussion of placenames and bearing in mind the widespread incidences of Ráth and Lios in towns across Ireland, we decided to bring an expert in. Sinéad Mercier, co-author of "The Men Who Eat Ringforts", drops in to tell Darach and Peadar all about these structures which link Ireland to its past. Is the word "fort" unnecessarily militaristic? If the deference for "fairies" has contributed positively to the preservation...
Feb 12, 2021•50 min•Ep. 164
Could the word slíbhín - a sly, sneaky so-and-so - possibly come from the word sliabh, meaning a mountain? Are mountain folk really that cunning, or do the people from counties with many a sliabh (counties where more Irish was historically spoken) just happen to have more fire in the belly when they move to the lowlands in search of work? In the third of our series on the recurring Irish words in placenames, Darach and Peadar discuss sliabh and cnoc (mountain and hill). What’s the difference bet...
Feb 05, 2021•41 min•Ep. 163
