Life
1919- ; b. 15 Aug., nr. Dromore, Co. Tyrone, son of a Donegal man; raised
Omagh, and ed. CBS Omagh; entered Jesuit Novitiate, Co. Laois; spinal
tuberculosis and convalescence; contrib. Father Mathew Record;
ed. UCD, grad. 1943; m. Maureen O’Connell in
1944, settling in Dublin; commenced MA in history, resulting in Counties
of Contention: A Study of the Origins and Implications of the Partition
of Ireland (1945); taken on as leader writer with The Irish Independent,
writing a column also; contrib. The Standard; lit. ed., Irish
Press, in succession to M. J. MacManus, 1945-64 [var. 1950, Daniel
Casey; Aosdána cites 1940-65]; wrote first novel as ‘King’s Shilling’, later
revised and published as short story in Irish Bookman on advise
of Francis MacManus; issued first novel, Land Without Stars (1946),
a tale set in Donegal and Co. Tyrone and concerning two brothers, one
of whom joins the IRA dies at the hands of the RUC; occas. lectures in
UCD English Department, attended by John Montague and others; issued Call
for a Miracle (1948), dealing with sexual relationships in contemporary
Dublin, and banned by Censorship Board; In a Harbour Green (1949),
set in the west of Ireland, concerns one man’s seduction of a woman
and another’s devotion to her; issued Modern Irish Fiction: A
Critique (1950), conceived of as the ‘first road’ across
the subject, and covering some fifty Irish novelist after independence;
writer-in-residence, Hollins College, Virginia, 1964; broadcast on William
Carleton for Sam Hanna Bell at BBC, Northern Ireland ("Poor Scholar”,
2 Oct. 1951); issued Honey Seems Bitter (1952), a ‘Catholic’
novel à la Graham Greene; The Cards of the Gambler (1953)
combining folkloric morality-tale and incidents of modern life in a narrative
of Heaven and Hell; There Was an Ancient House (1955), recounting
the story of a troubled novitiate; The Captain and the Whiskers (1960),
retaling Owen Rodgers’s recollections of the martinet Captain Chesney
and his daughter Greta, whose love for him Owen discoverd from her diary
long after; short story collections incl. A Journey to the Seven Streams
(1963); ; taught
creative writing, in Virginia (1964), Oregon University (1965-66), and
Emory University, Georgia, 1966-68; contrib. ‘Letters
from America’ to The Irish Times; stories to New Yorker,
and reviews to New York Times Book Review, and stories and
sketches to Kenyon Review; also contrib. to The Nation,
&c.; issued Dogs Enjoy the Morning (1968); returned to Dublin,
1968; radio and tv appearances; publ. ‘Down Then by Derry’,
Dublin Magazine (1970); issued and A Ball of Malt and Madam
Butterfly (1973); elected MIAL; accepted appointment at Univ. of Delaware,
Spring 1976; issued Proxopera (1977), based on the IRA Herrema
kidnapping; founding member of Aosdána; and A Cow in the House
(1978); ed. Penguin Book of Irish Short Stories (1981); Nothing
Happens in Carmincross (1985), novel dealing with Ulster sectarianism
and extremist violence; issued Drink to the Bird (1992), autobiography;
has lived at addresses in Rathgar and Donnybrook; elected Saoi of Aosdána,
March 1996; a celebration of his 80th birthday was held, with addresses
by Tom Kilroy, Val Mulkerns, and others and readings by himself at the
James Joyce Museum (N. Gt. George’s St.) and broadcast on RTE on
Jan. 2, 2000; lives in Donnybrook; there is a head by Majorie Fitzgibbon
in the RDS; there is a portrait by Edward McGuire; also a documentary . DIW DIL IF2 FDA
OCIL WJM
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Works
Short Stories, A Journey to the Seven Streams: Seventeen Stories
(London: Methuen 1963); A Ball of Malt and Madame Butterfly,
A Dozen Stories (London: Victor Gollancz 1973; rep. Penguin 1976)
[12 stories; infra]; A Cow in the House
(London: Victor Gollancz 1978) [var. 1977]; The State of Ireland: A
Novella and Seven Short Stories (Boston: David R. Godine 1981); A
Letter to Peachtree (London: Victor Gollancz 1987; Methuen 1987);
The Trout in the Turnhole (Dublin: Wolfhound ?1996), 107 pp. [children’s
story]; McCann, ed., The Collected Stories of Benedict Kiely (London:
Methuen 2001), 780pp.
Novels, Land Without Stars
(London: Christopher Johnson 1946; Moytura Press 1990, 1994), 221pp.;
Call for a Miracle (London: Methuen 1948), 228pp. In a Harbour
Green (London: Jonathan Cape 1949; Moytura Press, 1992, 1994), 277pp.;
Call for a Miracle (London: Methuen 1948), 228pp.; The Cards
of the Gambler (London: Methuen 1953), 242pp.; Do., rep., with
intro. by Thomas Flanagan (Dublin: Wolfhound Press; Chester Springs: Dufour
1995), 240pp.; Honey Seems Bitter (NY: DP Dutton 1952; London:
Methuen 1954), and Do., rep. in USA as The Evil Men Do (NY:
Dell 1954); There Was an Ancient House (London: Methuen 1955; reiss.
Wolfhound Press 1997); The Captain with the Whiskers (London: Methuen
1960; Dublin: Poolbeg 1980) [ded. his father ‘who talked with the
wizard Doran on the Cornavara Mountain’]; Dogs Enjoy the Morning
(London: Victor Gollancz 1968; Wolfhound 1996); Proxopera: A Tale of
Modern Ireland (London: Victor Gollancz 1977; Methuen 1989); Nothing
Happens in Carmincross (London: Victor Gollancz; Boston: David R.
Godine 1985) [with epigraphs, incl. Joyce, ‘history is a nightmare
from which I am trying to escape’].
Autobiography, Drink to the Bird: An Omagh Boyhood (London: Methuen 1992). Commentary & Travel, Counties of Contention: A Study of the Origins and Implications of the Partition of Ireland (Cork: Mercier 1945), 188pp., and Do., [rep. edn.], with new preface and intro. by John Hume (Dublin: Mercier Press 2004), 206pp.; Poor Scholar: A Study of the Works and Days of William Carleton 1794-1869 (London & NY: Sheed & Ward, 1947; Dublin: Talbot Press 1972); Modern Irish Fiction: A Critique (Dublin: Golden Eagle Books 1950); All the Way to Bantry Bay and Other Irish Journeys (London: Victor Gollanz 1978); Benedict Kiely, A Raid into Dark Corners and Other Essays (Cork UP 1999), 282pp. [infra].
Anthologies (collections) , ed., Penguin Book of Irish Short Stories (Harmondsworth: Penguin 1981), 544pp.; sel., Anthologie de Nouvelles Irlandaises, choisies par Benedict Kiely et traduites sous la direction de Jacqueline Genet [Centre de Littérature, Civilisation, et Linguistique des Pays de Langue Anglaises/RCP D’Études Irlandaises] (Université de Caen 1987), 584pp.
Journalism, ‘Orange Lily’, The Irish Bookman, 1, 10 (June 1947) [incl. remarks on Shan Bullock]; ‘Canon Sheehan, The Reluctant Novelist’, in Irish Writing 37 (Autumn 1957), pp.35-45; ‘Moore of Moore Hall, [Reassessment 2], Irish Times, Jan. 14 1971; ‘Orange Lily in a Green Garden’, Irish Times [four parts article on Shan Bullock [of which] Pt. 3, Irish Times (29 Dec. 1972); also ‘Among the Masters’, in Seán Dunne, ed., The Cork Review [Seán O Faoláin Special Issue] (Cork 1991), pp.87-89.
Miscellaneous, ed., Penguin Short Stories, 5 (Harmondsworth: Penguin 1970); ‘The Poets and Prosemen’, in Seán Lucy, Irish Poets in English (Mercier 1972), pp.118-130; Introduction to Myles Na Gopaleen, The Various Lives of Keats and Chapman, and The Brother (London: Hart Davis & MacGibbon 1976), 156pp.; intro., Paddy Tunney, The Stone Fiddle: My Way to Traditional Song (Dublin: Gilbert Dalton 1979); ‘The Historical Novel’ in Augustine Martin, ed., The Genius of Irish Prose (Cork: Mercier 1985), pp.53-66; Ireland from the Air (Aerofilm 1985; London: Weidenfeld & Nicolson 1991); intro. Seamus O’Kelly, The Weaver’s Grave [Classic Irish Fiction Series] (London: Allison & Busby 1984); Yeat’s Ireland: An Illustrated Anthology (Aurum Press 1989, 1992), ills. incl. Jack B. Yeats’s ‘A Connacht Priest’ [from Birmingham’s Irishmen All]; ed., As I Rode by Granard Moat (Dublin: Lilliput 1996), 220pp. [three centuries of song and lyric]; ed., [replacing D. J. O’Donoghue’s older introduction], William Carleton: An Autobiography [facs. of 1896 edn.] (Belfast: White Row Press 1996), 248pp. QRY, God’s Own Country (Minerva 1993). Jouranl contributions, ‘from A Broken Tree’, in The Recorder: Journal of the Irish American Historical Society, 13, 1 (Spring 2000), pp.38-61.
A Raid into Dark Corners and Other Essays
(Cork UP 1999), pp.282, with index. [ded. Douglas Gageby and Jim McGuinness],
preface by John Montague [xii-xiv]; reprints ‘Ned McKeown’s
Two Doors: An Approach to the Novel in Ireland’, from Ireland
and the Arts, ed. Tim Pat Coogan (London: Quartet [q.d.]) [1]; ‘Land
Without Stars; Aodhagan O’Rahilly’, prev. in The Capuchin
Annual, 1945-46 [8]; ‘The Great Gazebo’ [31-44; no source
given]; ‘A Raid into Dark Corners: The Poems of Seamus Heaney’,
prev. in The Hollins Critic (Oct 1978) [45]; ‘Love and Pain
and Parting: The Novels of Kate O’Brien’, prev. in The Hollins
Critic (December 1992) [55]; ‘Irish Potato and Attic Salt’,
The Irish Bookman (November 1946) [66]; ‘The Cormorant and
the Badger: The Stories of Patrick Boyle’, The Irish Times (16
March 1982) [79]; ‘Clay and Gods and Men: The Worlds of James Stephens’,
The Irish Bookman (October 1946) [84]; ‘Praise God for Ireland:
The Novels of Francis MacManus’, The Kilkenny Magazine (Spring/Summer
1970) [95]; ‘Charles Kickham and the Living Mountain’, prev.
in The Irish Times [n.d.] [107]; ‘John Montague: Dancer in
a Rough Field’, prev. in The Hollins Critic (December 1978)
[119]; Chapters are ‘Sean O’Faoláin: A Tiller of Ancient
Soil’ [124; no source]; ‘The Whores on the Halfdoors: An Image
of the Irish Writer’, prev . in The Kilkenny Magazine (Spring/Summer
1966) [134]; ‘The Coppinger Novels of Bruce Arnold’, prev. in
The Hollins Critic (April 1984) [150]; ‘Chronicle by Rushlight:
Daniel Corkery’s Quiet Desperation’, The Irish Bookman (January
1948) [156]; ‘Thomas Flanagan: The Lessons of History’, prev.
in The Hollins Critic (October 1981) [161]; ‘That Old Triangle:
A Memory of Brendan Behan’, prev. in The Hollins Critic [n.d.]
169]; ‘Canon Sheehan: The Reluctant Novelist’ [no source; 181]
‘Liam O’Flaherty: From the Stormswept Rock [...] ’, prev.
in The Month, II (September 1949) [192]; ‘The Two Masks of
Gerald Griffin’, prev. in Studies (Autumn 1972) [203]; ‘Orange
Lily in a Green Garden: Shan F. Bullock’, prev. in The Irish Times
(1972) [215]; ‘Dialect and Literature’ [232; no source]; Frank
O’Connor and the Long Road to Ummera [no source; 241]; ‘Memories
of the Mountainy Singer’ [no source; 248]; ‘The Thorn in the
Water: The Stories of Michael McLaverty’, prev. in Hibernia
(17 July 1970) [256]; ‘Green Island, Red South: Mary Lavin and Flannery
O’Connor’, prev. in The Kilkenny Magazine (Autumn/Winter
1970) [259]. Note, ‘The Whores Above the Half-Doors: An Image of
the Irish Writer’, also appeared in Owen Dudley Edwards, ed., Conor
Cruise O’Brien Introduces Ireland (1969), pp.148-61; see Quotations,
infra.]
The Penguin Book of Irish Short Stories, ed. Benedict Kiely (Harmondsworth: Penguin 1981), 544pp. Introduction; Acknowledgements; Lady Gregory, ‘The Daughter of King Under-Wave’ (from An Fianaiocht) [15]; The Cards of The Gambler’, Traditional, translated by the Editor [22], William Carleton, ‘Wildgoose Lodge’ [28]; Stephen Gwynn, ‘St Brigid’s Flood’ [48] Somerville and Ross, ‘Lisheen Races, Second-Hand’ [68]; George Moore, ‘Home Sickness’ [84]; Daniel Corkery, ‘The Ploughing Of Leaca-na-Naomh’ [97]; James Joyce, ‘Grace’ [108]; Liam O’Flaherty, ‘The Tent’ [130]; Liam O’Flaherty, ‘The Conger Eel’ [139]; Sean O’Faolain, ‘The Lovers of the Lake’ [143]; Frank O’Connor, ‘The Luceys’ [172]; Elizabeth Bowen, ‘The Cat Jumps’ [190]; Mary Lavin, ‘A Memory’ [201]; Michael McLaverty, ‘The Game Cock’ [248]; Seamus de Faoite, ‘The American Apples’ [258]; Julia O’Faolain, ‘First Conjugation’ [275]; Patrick Kavanagh, ‘Fairyland’ [287]; Mervyn Wall, ‘They Also Serve ...’ [291]; William Trevor, ‘A Meeting In Middle Age’ [299]; Terence de Vere White, ‘Desert Island [316]; Patrick Boyle, ‘Meles Vulgaris’ [329]; Bryan MacMahon, ‘Ballintierna in the Morning’ [348]; Aidan Higgins, ‘Lebensraum’ [357]; Michael J. Murphy, ‘Return of the Boy’ [371]; James Plunkett, ‘The Eagles and the Trumpets’ [386]; Brian Friel, ‘Mr Sing, My Heart’s Delight’ [411]; John McGahern, ‘Gold Watch’ [423]; Val Mulkerns, ‘A Cut above the Rest’ [440]; John Montague, ‘That Dark Accomplice’ [454]; John Jordan, ‘Let the Old Cry’ [465], Tom MacIntyre, ‘The Bracelet’ [471]; Edna O’Brien, ‘The Creature’ [475]; Ita Daly, ‘Such Good Friends’ [482]; Neil Jordan, ‘Sand’ [494]; Eithne Strong, ‘Red Jelly’ [499]; Bernard McLaverty; ‘Secrets’ [515]; Gillman Noonan, ‘Dear Parents, I’m Working for the EEC!’ [524]; Biographical Notes [537].
Radio One: John Quinn, ‘Travels with Ben’, a new twelve part summer series in which John Quinn accompanies writer Ben Kiely on a tour of Ireland in ballad and comic and serious verse (RTE/Radio 1; from 10 June 2002 @ Mondays, 8.30p.m.): "Such is Ben’s gift as a reciter and storyteller listeners are transported to the most unusual places (from Drumquin Creamery to the "city" of Mullingar) and meet a range of unforgettable characters, from the Boys of Collooney to the Limerick Rake".’ (Online Guide.)
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Criticism
Grace Eckley, ‘The Fiction of Benedict Kiely’, Éire-Ireland,
3, 4 (Winter 1968), pp.55-65.
Francis MacManus, review of Modern Irish Fiction, in Studies (March 1952), pp.121-22.
William Kennedy, review of Carmincross in NY Times Review of Books, 27 Oct. 1952, pp.7.
Daniel J. Casey, Benedict Kiely [Irish Writers Series] (Lewisburg: Bucknell UP 1974).
Grace Eckley, Benedict Kiely (NY: Twayne 1975).
J. W. Foster, Forces and Themes in Ulster Fiction (Dublin: Gill & Macmillan 1974), pp.72-81; 91-100.
Kevin Sullivan, ‘Benedict Kiely: The Making of a Novelist’, in Patrick Rafroidi and Maurice Harmon, eds., The Irish Novel in Our Time, l’Université de Lille 1975-76, pp.200-207.
Jennifer Clarke, ‘Q & A: an interview with Benedict Kiely’, in Irish Literary Supplement, 6, No. 1 (Spring 1987), p.10-12.
John Cooney, ‘Kiely Praises Novel’s Insight into Donegal’, in Irish Times, 26 Aug 1985, p.11.
Julia Carlson [interview with Kiely], Banned in Ireland (Georgia UP; London: Routledge 1990), pp.23-35 [with photo-port.].
Daniel J.Casey, ‘Benedict Kiely’, in Rüdiger Imhof, ed., Contemporary Irish Novelists [Studies in English and Comparative Literature] (Tübingen: Gunter Narr Verlag 1990), pp.25-39.
The Recorder: Journal of the American Irish Historical Society (Spring 1996), celebration of Kiely’s 75th birthday; contribs. Kiely; Kevin Sullivan; Thomas Flanagan; Val Mulkerns, Seamus Heaney, William Kennedy, John Montague, Thomas Kinsella, Thomas Kilroy, John Wilson Foster, Liam de Paor; Darcy O’Brien, Julian Moynihan, et al.].
[Shirley Kelly], ‘Benedict Kiely, Writer and Saoi’, feature article, in Books Ireland (Summer 2001), pp.157-58.
Woodweaver: the Legend of Benedict Kiely (?2002), a documentary with Seamus Heaney, John Montague,Tom Kilroy and Colm McCann speaking on the writer; dir. Roger Hudson and produced by Simon Hudson (Stoney Road Films 2005), presented on RTÉ1 (Sunday 20 March 2005/10.50pm).
John Dunne, reviewing Carmincross in Books Ireland (May 1987).
J. W. Foster, Colonial Conseqences (Dublin: Lilliput Press 1991), a for full discussion of Kiely, Honey Seems Bitter (1954), There was an Ancient House (1955), and Dogs Enjoy the Morning (1968), p.36. See also “Benedict Kiely”, in Robert Hogan, ed., A Dictionary of Irish Literature, Dublin: Gill & Macmillan 1979).
Gerry Smyth, Decolonisation and Criticism: The Construction of Irish Literature, London: Pluto Press 1998, pp.200-01.
Patricia Craig, review of Benedict Kiely, Drink to the Bird (Methuen 1992), 180pp. in Times Literary Supplement, April 24 1992.
Brendan Kennelly, on As I Rode by Granard Moat (1996), in ‘Speaking Volumes’, ed. Seamus Hosey [RTÉ]., quoted in publisher’s note for As I Rode by Granard Moat (1996), 220pp.
John Boland, ‘A rhyming ramble round Ireland, review of As I Rode by Granard Moat (Dublin: Lilliput 1996), 220pp., in Irish Times, 25 Jan. 1997.
[Shirley Kelly,] ‘Benedict Kiely, Writer and Saoi’ [feature article], in Books Ireland (Summer 2001), pp.157-58.
Colum McCann, Introduction to The Collected Stories of Benedict Kiely (London: Methuen 2001), in Irish Times, Weekend, 26 May 2001, p.14.
John Kenny, ‘Love and Locality’, review of Benedict Kiely, The Collected Stories, intro. Colm McCann (London: Methuen 2001), 762pp., in Times Literary Supplement, 20 June 2001.
Bridget O’Toole, review of The Collected Stories of Benedict Kiely (Methuen), in Books Ireland, Feb. 2002, p.24.
Alan O’Riordan, review of rep. edn. of The Captain with the Whiskers, in Books Ireland (May 2004.
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Notes
Desmond Clarke, Ireland in Fiction [Pt. II] (Cork: Royal
Carbery 1985), lists Land Without Stars (London: Christopher Johnson
1946); Cards of the Gambler (London: Methuen 1953) [Irish seanachie
in Donegal tells story in Irish of drunken gambler meeting God. When God
baptised the Gambler’s child, Death is the godparent. Scene changes
to modern clubhouse; a doctor loses everything gambling and thinks himself
damned; meets God disguised as a young priest in public house among drunken
dancers; meets Death in another; God batpises his child in pro-Cathedral,
Dublin, with Death as sponsor; Lunching with these in a café after,
he is promised the power to win at gambling, to heal his patients, and
to have a unwelcome passenger stuck in the seat of his car [!]; when he
breaks the undertaking with Death not to attempt to save life on certain
occasions, he dies, and is ‘admitted to heaven with some difficulty’]
; Honey Seems Bitter (Methuen 1954); Call for a Miracle
(London: Methuen 1948), 228pp. [var. J. Cape 1950; IF2; FDA DIW &
DIL OCIL]; In a Harbour Green (London Jonathan Cape 1949); There
Was an Ancient House (Methuen 1955 1955) [minute, accurate picture
of life in Jesuit novitiate; Barragry, once a journalist, finds life there
uncongenial and returns to his profession; McKenna, something of a poet,
falls into ill-health and is sent to a sanitorum; other sketch with certainties,
doubts, aspirations and weaknesses; portrait of Master of Studies sympathetic
and appreciative]. Note inconsistency in publication dates; Note also,
Land Without Stars (1947) [sic DIW].
Andrew Carpenter & Peter Fallon, eds., The Writers: A Sense of Place (Dublin: O’Brien Press 1980), contains ‘Homeward Bound’, part of the opening of a novel to be called, perhaps, Nothing Happens in Carmincross, with photo-port., pp.[86-90].
Library of Congress lists Nothing Happens in Carmin Cross [sic] (Boston: D. R. Godine [c.1985]), 279pp. 1. Irish Americans – travel – Fiction – N. Ireland. 2. Weddings – N. Ireland - fiction 3. Family – N. Ireland – Fiction.
Books in Print (1994), Land Without Stars (London: Christopher Johnson 1946; Moytura 1990, 1994); In a Harbour Green (London: J. Cape 1949; Moytura Press, 1992, 1994); Honey Seems Bitter (NY: Dutton 1952; London: Methuen 1954; [also as The Evil Men Do NY: Dutton 1954]; Moytura 1992, 1994); The Captain with the Whiskers (London: Methuen 1960; Poolbeg 1980); A Journey to the Seven Streams and Other Stories (London: Methuen 1963; Poolbeg 1978); A Ball of Malt and Madame Butterfly, A Dozen Stories (London: Victor Gollancz 1973; Penguin 1976); Proxopera (London: Victor Gollancz 1977);A Cow in the House and Other Stories (London: Victor Gollancz 1978); A Letter to Peachtree (London: Victor Gollancz 1987; Methuen 1987); God’s Own Country (Minerva 1993); Penguin Irish Short Stories (Penguin 1981; 1991) [0 14 0053 40 9]; Drink to the Bird: An Omagh Boyhood (Minerva 1992, 1994); ed., Dublin (OUP 1983)]; Benedict Kiely, Yeats’s Ireland (Aurum Press 1989, 1992); All the Way to Bantry and Other Irish Journeys (Victor Gollancz 1978); Kiely, intro. Paddy Tunney, The Stone Fiddle, My Way to Traditional Song (Dublin: Gilbert Dalton 1979), 179pp.; intro., Myles Na Gopaleen, the Various Lives of Keats and Chapman, and The Brother (HartDavis MacGibbon 1976), 156pp.; Aerofim Book of Ireland from the Air [new ed. pb.] (London: Weidenfeld and Nicolson 1991); intro. Seamus OKelly, The Weaver’s Grave (Allison & Busby 1984) [Classic Irish Fiction Series 0332-1347; 6]
Belfast Public Library holds The Cards of the Gambler (1953); Counties of Contention (1945); Honey Seems Bitter (1954); In a Harbour Green (1949); Land Without Stars (1946); Modern Irish Fiction (1950); Poor Scholar (1947); There Was an Ancient House (1955).
Peter Ellis (Cat. 20) lists The Cards of the Gambler (London: Methuen 1953), 242pp.
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Benedict Kiely Literary Weekend (1001- ) in Co Tyrone in Silverbirch Hotel, Omagh, September. The third such gathering (17 to 19 Sept. 2004) included an opening keynote speech by John Hume and lectures by Maurice Harmon (on Kiely’s mastery of the short story), Owen Dudley Edwards (an historical overview of his work), John Wilson Foster (Irish fiction and the wars) and Ciaran Carson.
Princess Grace Irish Library (Monaco)