Author masters his education 40 years after earning his infamy

BAD boy of Irish writing, Lee Dunne, yesterday fulfilled a half-century-old promise to himself by graduating with his first ever educational qualification.

Dunne, who so far has had to make do with the title of Ireland’s most banned author, can now refer to himself by the rather grander appellation of Masters of Screenwriting, Shakespeare and Greek Tragedy.

The veteran writer, who turns 70 next month, achieved the feat at the Dun Laoghaire Institute of Art and Design where he enrolled in formal classes for the first time since leaving school at the age of 13.

And despite swapping the satchel at a young age for the kind of life of adventure and misadventure that fuelled many of his works, he said going back to the classroom was one of the best things he ever did.

“I had a ball. I went to school like the happiest teenager on earth. I never missed a class. I was never late. I loved it,” he said.

The course directors were initially puzzled by their prospective pupil’s eagerness to enrol given that he had already spent four decades demonstrating his ability to write in novel form as well as for stage and screen.

But Dunne convinced them to take him on board by explaining that he wanted to learn the trade rather than just indulge the art. “I wanted to know what I was doing. I end up with a novel and say, where the hell did that come from? I want to be able to tell people how I write so that maybe I can teach others.”

He also confided that it was no hardship to be forced to study the old film noirs he grew up with when most of his classmates were faced with them for the first time. “I was in my element. I was trawling through my childhood and memories of my youth and it was a joy.”

His passion paid off as he was awarded an honours degree when he received his scroll at the graduation ceremony in Dublin yesterday, but he isn’t about to slacken his pace now.

Now living in Bray, Co Wicklow with his third wife, Maura, Dunne produced two books in one year, novel Barleycorn Blues and the first instalment of his autobiography, No Time for Innocence, before enrolling in college.

He is now consulting with the Irish Film Board about turning a screenplay he wrote as part of the course into a film. He is also writing the follow-up to Barleycorn Blues, and is putting the finishing touches to a historical saga, Dances of Fortune, which will finally be published in April after a 21-year gestation.

Dunne is also looking forward to the publication next year of the 40th anniversary edition of his first and best known novel, Goodbye to the Hill, which made him his name and notoriety.