Latest news with #NellMcCafferty
Irish Times
24-05-2025
- Irish Times
Girl with a Fork in a World of Soup by Rosita Sweetman: A short, lively and fast-paced memoir
Girl with a Fork in a World of Soup Author : Rosita Sweetman ISBN-13 : 978-1739570545 Publisher : Menma Books Guideline Price : €17.50 There's a sense of doom in the vivid child-impression idyll created by Rosita Sweetman's shining prose in the first part of this short, fast-paced memoir. Sweetman loved being the middle child of nine, amid the fun, varied bustle of a large, happy and wealthy political-legal Dublin family. But a background of homes on Fitzwilliam Square and along Dublin's elite southside coast – Connemara ponies in rambling gardens, canters on the beach – wasn't enough to shield Sweetman from the pain of being female under patriarchal rule and a misogynistic culture. Born in the mid-1940s, Sweetman came of age under Catholic theocracy in a State that systematically reduced women and girls to third-class citizenship. In response, she joined other Irish feminists in the late 1960s, co-founding the short-lived but pivotal Irish Women's Liberation Movement. She used her journalistic flair to spread feminist ideas in national newspapers and shared pints and politics with figures like Nell McCafferty. Sweetman had early success with bestselling non-fiction books, On Our Knees, and On Our Backs: Sexual Attitudes in a Changing Ireland, and her feminist novel, Fathers Come First. But a damaging relationship with an older, already-married man, begun when she was just 17, devastated her literary ambitions. They married (he was British so could divorce) and were together for 20 years. She managed to escape with her two young children, a Herculean feat at a time when there was no divorce in Ireland, and women who left could be framed as 'deserters', risking home and custody, never mind court-ordered child maintenance. READ MORE Girl with a Fork captures the painful paradox of how a woman steeped in feminist politics can still get entangled in male supremacist abuse – emotional, sexual, physical, and financial. Sweetman lays it bare: the gaslighting, the erosion of confidence, the exhaustion of broke single-handed parenting, while her husband serially cheated, including with relatives, repeatedly abandoning and returning. What's redemptive about this harrowing tale is Sweetman's subtle casting back – through therapy – to trace how family trauma, especially her younger sister's childhood death, and a harsh convent education played into her entrapment. With brave honesty, Sweetman admits how, in her damaged state, she was passing on to her children the emotional abuse she'd suffered – until healing enabled her to break the chain.
Yahoo
08-03-2025
- General
- Yahoo
'Wild child from the Bogside' honoured with new mural
A new mural has been completed in Londonderry in memory of the late writer and prominent feminist campaigner Nell McCafferty. She died in August at the age of 80 and was described as a thorn in the side of the establishment. The mural has been completed by the Peaball Street Art Collective, and its official unveiling on Saturday in the Bogside will be part of the marking of International Women's Day. Shá Gillespie, a close friend of McCafferty, said she wanted to honour her contribution to Irish life for some time. "Every time I come through the Bogside, even before Nell died, I always thought that Nell McCafferty needs to be on these walls," Ms Gillespie said. "She's such an individual, a famous Bogside woman, and she did so much for women in Ireland. "Nell McCafferty, to me, was a woman who was fearless, and she was an icon. She spoke out for marginalised people. "She spoke up for women who probably didn't have a voice back in the early seventies when it was really difficult for women to speak. And I think that's just who Nell is. "She was just fierce; that's how I would describe her. Ms Gillespie said she was impressed by the mural: "It's Nell," she said. "The words on the mural, 'Goodnight Sisters', those were the final words from Nell on her radio show. It's beautiful. It's perfect." McCafferty, who died peacefully at a nursing home in Fahan in County Donegal in August, was the author of several books, and a founding member of the Irish Women's Liberation Movement. She campaigned for the legalisation of contraception in the Republic of Ireland and was involved in a protest where she and other women brought contraceptives over the border from Northern Ireland by train from Belfast to Dublin. The veteran civil rights campaigner and fellow journalist Eamonn McCann remembers her fondly. "She was a product of her time, and she was a product of where she came from - Beechwood Street in the heart of the Bogside - and she never forgot that. "She would get extremely angry if anybody criticised the Bogside or even criticised Derry," Mr McCann said. "She had a possessive attitude towards Derry as so many of us have, and I think there's many of us who will remember Nell not as a public figure, not as a speaker or a writer. "We will remember Nell as a wild child from the Bogside. She inspired or evoked strong reactions. Even people who loved Nell were a wee bit afraid of her, including me. "It's right that you have icons on gables of our houses to remind you of who defined the area, of who defined the time in Derry. Nell did that, and for that she will literally forever be remembered," Mr McCann said. "The mural's very good because it captures Nell. Her personality shines out of that mural." McCafferty's sister Carmel McCallion said the Bogside mural was a fitting tribute as it was close to their family home. "It would take me a long time to tell you about our Nell, but to wrap her up in as many words as I can - she was fun, she was honest, she was direct, she was lovable, she was cruel when she wanted to be, she was bad tempered and she was my sister," Ms McCallion said. She said their mother was an inspiration to the entire family. "We had a mother that was well before her time. Nell learnt a lot from my mother. I think maybe one of Nell's greatest moments was when she told my mother she was lesbian. "She put her arms around Nell and she said 'you're my daughter, you're a daughter of Ireland and if anybody ever hurts you just direct them to your mother.'"
