Life
1954- ; b. Dublin; dg. of an English-speaking Dublin mother and a father who was a carpenter from the Donegal Gaeltacht; ed. Scoil Chatríona; UCD (English prize, 1971),
folklore scholarship to University of Copenhagen, Denmark; M Phil., and
Ph.D. in Folklore and Medieval Literature (UCD 1982); Asst. Keeper, National
Library of Ireland; m. Bo Almqvist; first published by David Marcus in
‘New Irish Writing’ (Irish Press), 1974; shortlisted
for Hennessy Award; scholarship to Listowel Writers’ Week, 1980;
Irish Independent Story of the Month award, 1980; ‘Fulfilment’
incl. in Heinemann Best Short Stories (1986); Arts Council bursary
in Literature, 1987; Blood and Water (1988), stories; a play, Dún
na mBan Tí Thine [‘The Woman’s Fort of Fire’]
(Peacock 1994); The Inland Ice (1997), nine stories, mostly suburban;
addressed WERRC Conference in Dublin on the theme, ‘Where has the
Feminist Sentence Gone?’ (May 1999); The Dancers Dancing (1999),
a novel set in a Donegal ‘Irish College’ in 1972, and nominated
for Orange Prize, 2000; issued The Pale Gold of Alaska (2000), nine stories, mostly suburban and set in Dublin, of which
the title-story is based on a hint in The Road to Klondike by Micí
Mac Gabhann and is set among Northern Irish emigrants to America; also
plays, books for children, scholarly articles and reviews; issued Dúnmharú
sa Dainghean (2000), a learner’s novel dealing with the escape
of Saoirse after the loss of her job, boyfriend and flat to the Kerry
Gaeltacht, where she becomes involved with a murder case; holder of Arts
Council Bursaries in Literature in 1986 and 1998; Bisto Book of the Year
Award, 1995; won Stewart Parker Drama Award, 1997, and Oireachtas Awards,
1998 and 2000; Butler Award for Prose, 2000; works as Assistant Keeper
in the National Library of Ireland; issued Midwife to the Fairies and
Other Stories (2003), new and selected. ATT
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Works
Short fiction, Blood and Water & Other Stories
(Dublin: Attic Press 1988). Eating Women is not Recommended (Dublin:
Attic 1992; rep. 1994); The Inland Ice & Other Stories (Belfast:
Blackstaff Press 1997; Review 2001), 262pp. [infra];
The Pale Gold of Alaska (Belfast: Blackstaff Press 2000), 240pp.;
Midwife to the Fairies: New and Selected Stories, preface by Anne
Fogarty (Attic Press 2003), 180pp.;
Novels, The Bray House (Dublin: Attic Press 1990); Hugo and the Sunshine Girl (Dublin: Poolbeg 1991), for children;The Dancers Dancing (Belfast: Blackstaff Press 2000; Review Press); Cailíní Beag Ghleann na mBláth (BAC: Cois Life 2003) , 186pp.
Drama, Milseog an tSamhraidh agus Dún na Mban Trí Thine (Cois Life 1998), 140pp.; Dúnmharú sa Dainghean (Cois Life [2000]), 236pp.
Miscellaneous, ed., with Séamas Ó Catháin, Viking Ale, Festscrift for Prof. Bo Almqvist (Boethius Press 1991); ed., Voices on the Wind, Women Poets of the Celtic Twilight (New Island Books 1995) [poems of Katharine Tynan; Eva Gore-Booth; Susan Mitchell; Nora Chesson Hopper; Ethna Carbery; Dora Sigerson Shorter], 144pp.;
Contributions, “Midwife to the Fairies” and “Blood and Water” in Blackstaff Book of Short Stories (1988); also, an essay to Ciaran Mac Murchaidh, Who needs Irish? Reflections on the importance of the Irish language Today (Veritas 2003).
Bibliographical
details
The Inland Ice and Other Stories
(Belfast: Blackstaff 1997), 262pp. [‘Gweedore Girl’; ‘Love,
Hate and Friendshp’; ‘Bills New Wife’; ‘Lily Marlene’;
‘Hot Earth’; ‘Estonia’; ‘Summer Pudding’;
‘Greenland;’; ‘How Lovely the Slopes Are’; ‘Swiss
Cheese’; ‘My Pet’; ‘The Woman with the Fish’;
‘the Search for the Lost Husband’]
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Criticism
Katie Donovan, review of Voices on the Wind: Women Poets of
the Celtic Twilight (New Island Books 1995), in The Irish Times
([10 Sept. 1995]).
Des Traynor, review of The Inland Ice and Other Stories (1997), in Books Ireland (Oct. 1999).
Gerry Smyth, The Novel and the Nation: Studies in the New Irish Fiction (London: Pluto Press 1997) [on The Bray House], pp.166-68.
Anne Fogarty, review of Eilís Ní Dhuibhne, The Pale Gold of Alaska and Other Stories (Blackstaff), in The Irish Times (30 Sept. 2000).
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Dún na mBan Tí Thine [‘The Woman’s Fort of Fire’], a play, was produced by An Amharclann de hIde (Peacock, 5-9 Nov. 1994); in it Lenni, former Rose of Tralee, passes from modern housewife to mermaid to the mother of a changling; her rebellion includes refusing to embroider the towers and shamrocks her teacher insists on.
"The Pale Gold of Alaska", title-story of the 2000 collection, concerns an Irish immigrant married to a taciturn and brutal Irishman from rural Co. Derry and who willingly consorts with an Amero-Indian displaced by the silver-miners, and is 'rescued' by her own kind (all based on a hint in The Road to Klondike by Micí Mac Gabhann). Other stories include that of an Irish graduate girl who is briefly married to an American whose attachment to her weakens when they settled in his homeland.
‘Don’t Worry, Be Abbey’, a discussion of National Theatre at the Abbey on its 90th birthday (Dec. 1994, Dublin) incls. contribution by Ní Dhuibhne advocating female playwrights, citing her own Dún na mBan Trí Thine, under auspices of Amharclann de hIde printed in Fortnight 336 (Feb. 1995), p.35 [see notice in Fortnight 333].
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Princess Grace Irish Library (Monaco)