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Maria Murphy talks about the Irish writer Seumas O’ Kelly (1881-1918), known as ‘The Gentle Revolutionary’.

Seumas O’Kelly was born in Loughrea, County Galway in 1881.
A contemporary of Sinn Féin founder Arthur Griffith and James Stephens, Seumas was the editor of two newspapers, The Southern Star, based in Skibbereen and later with the Leinster Leader in Naas, both still published to this day. He took the editors job with Nationality, the Sinn Fein newspaper at the request of Arthur Griffith when he was interned by the British in 1918.

In his spare time, he was an elegant storyteller with a keen social observation, penning many plays and short stories and two novels.

His most famous work is The Weaver’s Grave, a long short story.
His first short story collection is titled Waysiders, and a posthumous second collection is titled The Golden Barque, set around the canal area near Naas, County Kildare.
His first novel is The Lady of Deerpark, which is available to borrow in most Public Libraries.

First broadcast on 13/11/24