Listowel Connection

This blog is a personal take on Listowel, Co. Kerry. I am writing for anyone anywhere with a Listowel connection but especially for sons and daughters of Listowel who find themselves far from home. Contact me at listowelconnection@gmail.com

Tag: Owen MacMahon

Cruinniú na Cásca 2017

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On April 18, 2017

In Uncategorized

Writers’ Week and The Seanchaí do Cruiniú na Cásca 2017



Monday April 17 2017 and we, in Listowel, were privileged to make a piece of history. We took part in the first annual Easter Monday 1916 commemorative event.

Photo: Eilish Stack

In the town park another piece of history was being made. The politicians were attending the official opening of the 1916 commemorative garden. I would have loved to be there as I have watched this beautiful space develop week by week and I really love it. 

I chose instead to go the literary route and take a walk by the river with Gabriel Fitzmaurice and other poets, singers and thespians.

We started at The Seanchaí. When I arrived at 10.45 the early birds were already arriving.

I was greeted at the door by Liz Dunne, chair of Listowel Writers’ Week and Máire Logue

Gabriel Fitzmaurice, our guide, was ready to start.

We started with a dramatic interlude from Vincent and Evangeline, two of the best interpreters of the work of John B. Keane, even though they are Limerick rather than Kerry actors. They are more Kerry than the Kerry people themselves.

There was a large and very appreciative attendance.

Owen MacMahon had the audience in the palm of his hand as we paused for a while on the bank go The Feale.

David Browne gave a spine chilling rendition of the songs of Carthalawn from John B.’s Sive.

 Even the younger members of the audience were enthralled.

We walked along the river walk and under the big bridge to where Mickey McConnell and Billy Keane were waiting to entertain us.

Then it was on to the Garden of Europe and more songs and drama. Evangeline and Vincent had us in stitches with a scene from Big Maggie. Owen sang a song of peace from Gary MacMahon.

At the graveyard, Claire Keane sang, Paddy MacElligott performed and a trio of singers and dancers entertained us.

On to the 1916 commemorative garden with its newly unveiled plaque.

Then back to The Seanchaí. Job done.

The MacMahon River Walk at Writers’ Week 2015

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On June 8, 2015

In Uncategorized

Heather at Bromore Cliffs, Ballybunion, Co. Kerry, June 2015

Photo: Bromore Cliffs

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A Writers’ Week Walking Tour

Vincent Carmody organizes a programme of walking tours every year at Writers’ Week. For many people these are among the high points of the festival and such is the reputation of the walks that it is now getting difficult to cope with the big numbers of people wanting to follow.

Last year’s river walk with Owen MacMahon was so talked about that this year I resolved not to miss it. So here I was (with my camera) at The Listowel Arms on Saturday morning May 28 2015 ready for a treat. I got it.

Owen MacMahon was our guide. Along the way he sang his late brother, Gary’s, songs, he read from his father’s works and he told anecdote after anecdote to the delight of his enthralled audience.

Our first stop was at Listowel castle. He told us a bit about the history of the castle and the famous siege.

We headed off for our walk along the banks of The Feale. We heard of a time when the river was teeming with fish and Owen’s late uncle, Bubs, liked nothing better than to slip away from his home and surgery on Market Street for a few hours fishing.

We learned that when the pontoon bridge linking the town with the racecourse collapsed into the Feale, the people who fell in were compensated with a new trousers. One man got two.

Owen telling another amusing tale of judges, courts of law and drinking.

Some people found a picturesque place to sit and listen.

Walkers hung on every word.

Owen and Vincent seemed to have identified appropriate perches along the way so we could see as well as hear them.

We stopped at the ball alley for another rann or two of a song.

At the Garden of Europe we listened amid reminders of Europe’s darkest hour. The tour finished in the nearby graveyard where  many of the people remembered along the way in so many anecdotes are buried. There were a few more footballing stories and a song or two before we dispersed, having made a great start to a memorable Writers’ Week Saturday. This Saturday was to end for me with a trip to Listowel Community Centre to see Graham Norton.

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Only in Kerry


Some well known local people pick the winning tickets from a very valuable ‘hat” in Brosnan’s Bar  at the charity fundraiser on Friday Night. Photos by John Kelliher.

Norah Browne
Sean Moriarty
Gerry O’Carroll

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Wild Atlantic Way Seaweed Festival

(Photo: Facebook)

This group were on the beach foraging for edible sea weed as part of the first Wild Atlantic Way Seaweed Festival in Ballybunion on Saturday June 6 2015.

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Adare, Saturday June 6 2015









These photos from the internet show the devastating fire that destroyed part of the picturesque terrace of cottages in Adare on Saturday. There was no loss of life but one lady who was renting one of the houses lost all her  possessions. It would appear that the fire started in one of the chimneys.

A picture paints a thousand words.

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On February 25, 2014

In Uncategorized

 Left to right; Helen Walsh, Grainne Keane Stack, Danny Hannon, Jed Chute, Norella Moriarty, Noreen O Mahoney in The Square during Writers Week 2010.

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Knockanure girls….no year

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John McGrath

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Lovely photo of three of the four surviving MacMahon brothers, Bryan, Owen and Jim

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The Feale Rangers team who went on to win their first league title

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Rivals on the racetrack; friends in the weigh room.

Another good one from Pat Healy: Davy Russell, Ruby Walsh and A.P McCoy enjoy a chat and a cuppa.

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Jesse Owens of the US salutes his country’s flag on the podium after winning gold at the 1936 Olympics which were held in Nazi Germany.

Words and Music and Saturday at Listowel Races 2013

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On October 15, 2013

In Uncategorized

 The entertainment at Listowel Writers’ Week Words and Music event on Saturday evening,

 October 12 2013 was second to none.

Kathy Nugent, accompanied on the piano by Colm O’Brien, had the audience in the palm of her hand with well known Doris Day, Sinatra and Tony Bennett numbers. Kathy has a powerful voice and a really winning stage presence.

Claire Keane gave us a lovely rendition of John B.’s Sweet Listowel.

Gabriel Fitzmaurice’s theme was family as he read some warm sonnets to his granddaughter, his late father and his wife. Admiration, awe and love shone through in every line.

Veronica, Bernie, Margaret and Norella, all from the Writers’ Week committee were working hard on the night.

This local group of multi talented young musicians wowed us all with their versatility and musicianship.

Mary Kenny was one of the star turns. She spoke about The Femme Fatale, Terry Keane and then in Part 2 she gave us a little insight into her own unconventional upbringing.

Cyril Kelly is one of a group of Listowel people exiled in Dublin. Like all of this group, he retains a huge affection for his native town and mines these happy memories of growing up in this special place in much of his writing. He read  a poem he wrote for Miriam Kiely, celebrating happy days as teenagers in Listowel. He also took up the theme of family with a revealing insight into his first venture into fatherhood in the days before epidurals, when pain relief had not advanced much further than mopping his wife’s brow with a flannel!

Owen MacMahon is an expert on his father’s work. He gave us a unique insight into Bryan MacMahon, short story writer. As always, his talk was laced with amusing local anecdotes, self deprecating humour and erudite classical and Irish references. He even ended with a song beloved of all past pupils of The Master, Kerry Candle Light.

A happy Seán Lyons, chairman, Listowel Writers’ Week signed off on a very successful evening.

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On the Saturday of The Harvest Meeting of Listowel Races 2013 I went to The Island en famille. I am a very proud mother and grandmother so people have been wondering where those Saturday photos went. Well, here they are…

Bobby Cogan met up with his friend, Fergus O’Connor who was at The Races with his dad.

 The boys studied form in the parade ring before committing their (or my) money.

€2 each way on Number 4.

Listowel Tidy Towns were holding an upcycling competition.

 Some people seemed a bit unsure of what constitutes upcycling.

There was a bit of early canvassing going on.

This lad was doing a good job of cleaning the ring.

Carine met a work colleague and family.

Clíona met her friend Gillian.

Madeleine and Margaret looked every stylish even though they told me that they were more dressed up the day before since it was Ladies’ Day.

Clíona and Seán picked a few winners.

Edel, Frances and Liam were winners in the upcycling competition.

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John Kelliher took this great picture of rutting stags in The National Park, Killarney

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Jer.’s video clip from the community procession at Listowel Parish Mission 2013

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=UO3vP5gyvfY&feature=youtu.be

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(Pic: Goracing)

A tug o war was one of the many fun events which took place at Limerick racecourse yesterday. All funds raised on the day will go to help injured jockies, Johnjo Bright and JP MacNamara

Local Writers celebrated at Writers’ Week 2013

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On June 12, 2013

In Uncategorized

One of the best parts of Writers’ Week for most local people is the opportunity to meet up with old friends who come home to Listowel for the festival. What better place to meet these friends than at a “local” event. One of these events this year was a tribute by Owen MacMahon to his late father, Bryan. Owen managed masterfully to show us what made Bryan MacMahon ‘tick”.

Our own local “údar agus oide” was brought to life before our eyes but we also got a glimpse of the great man as father and husband. Owen shared his unique insights into everyday life with a disciplined writer, a man of fixed habits but above all a story teller extraordinaire. Maybe a more fitting title would be ” údar, scéalaí agus oide” .

Owen’s enormous pride in his father shone through in every anecdote. Bryan MacMahon was a writer deeply rooted in his native place. He respected and honoured his own people: he celebrated them in ballads and stories but he always treated them gently and with a tolerant teacher’s understanding of the shortcomings of the human condition.

The singing of Karen Trench, Philip Enright and Sonny Egan added to this gem of a performance; for me the theatrical high point of this year’s Writers’ Week.

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I met a group of old Listowellians, pictured below, reunited as they left St. John’s after another vituoso local performance from essayist, Cyril Kelly. Cyril has the gift of turning the minutae of everyday life as he lives it, into charming evocative pieces with  universal appeal. 

His essays are a delight to read on the page but far far more delightful when read in his distinctive musical voice.

Cyril Kelly reading in St. John’s
Vincent Carmody introducing Cyril to the audience.

Cyril gave a second performance on Saturday in Tae Lane Store where he spoke about growing up in the house of a milliner. I’ll tell you more about that tomorrow.

School friends and old neighbors, Máire MacMahon and Anne Cogan met up during writers’ Week 2013.

 Joan Regan and Jim Cogan take a stroll before the theatre on Sunday night. They saw King of Carnage, an enjoyable light hearted farce, just the ticket for those suffering from literary overload.

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This picture of Ballybunion on Friday June 8 2013 comes from

https://www.facebook.com/pages/BALLYBUNION-not-just-a-placemore-a-way-of-life/125749737436255

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