Beginner’s Pluck: Galway writer and editor Mary O’Donoghue
Mary O’Donoghue. Pic: James McNaughton
Brought up on a small farm on the edge of the Burren, Mary was the eldest of three girls. She read early.
“My mother remembers me reading a newspaper aged three.”
After university she started teaching English and History in a school in Galway, as well as teaching English at NUI Galway. During this time she wrote poetry through an evening class in the Galway Arts Centre.
“Louis de Paor took the class. I’ve since translated his poetry from Irish to English.”
Mary then left for America and became a part-time lecturer at Babson College near Boston.
“Visa restrictions meant I couldn’t work elsewhere, so I had time to write again. I was trying short stories, and the only one to really work turned into a novel. was published in 2010, the year I got my green card.”
She’s been teaching in Babson College ever since, but has taken two sabbaticals: “During the first one, in 2018, I lived in Alabama. I still live there when I’m not teaching.”
The other, last spring, was in Villanova where Mary was the Heimbold Chair of Irish Studies.
“I finished the collection there.”
The author of several poetry collections and translations, Mary is senior editor at the literary magazine, .
1975/ Galway but raised in Clare.
St Joseph’s Convent in Gort. NUI Galway, BA in English and History and MPhil in Irish Studies.
Alabama.
Husband James McNaughton, an Irish Beckett scholar, and stepdaughter, Niamh.
College Professor at Babson College.
“I almost went into architecture.”
Mavis Gallant; Maeve Brennan; Joy Williams; Tatyana Tolstaya; Leonard Michaels; Amy Hempel.
“I’ll be working on more short stories, and another novel.”
“It’s OK to flail around as long as you stay at it. Be willing to let things go.”
The Hour after Happy Hour. The Stinging Fly Press, €15.00
Whether examining the strained relationships between parents and children; or following friends in discussion of failed love affairs, these literary stories of emigration, transit, and exile are both entertaining and thought provoking.
Clever, witty and sophisticated. Beautifully written.
