Purchase of this book includes free trial access to www.million-books.com where you can read more than a million books for free. This is an OCR edition with typos. Excerpt from book: CHAPTER III SOURCES The Translators: George Sigerson. Douglas WHILE Standish O'Grady revealed the wonders of Irish bardic literature, and sent the poets to the heroic age for the themes of a new song more truly expressive of the national spirit, it was left to others to explore fields hardly less rich in unexploited treasures of the Celtic imagination. The Literary Revival has been characterised, not only by the resuscitation of the great historical figures and events of Irish an– tiquity, but also by the restoration to letters of the beautiful songs and stories of folk-lore, which were being rapidly obliterated by the increasing Anglicisa- tion of the countryside. The work of the translators and folklorists who collected, transcribed and translated these folk tales and songs, in which the old Celtic traditions still lived, was an important element in the forces that went to the formation of modern Anglo-Irish literature. It is true, however, that this work did not give so direct an impulse to the literary renascence as that of Standish James O'Grady, and belongs more properly to the history of the Gaelic movement, which has done so much to preserve the Irish language, literature and customs. Nevertheless, certain of these writers have exercised a greater influence upon Anglo-Irish letters thanothers, an influence beyond that which might be expected from mere translation, and cannot, therefore, be omitted from a consideration of the Literary Revival. Moreover, as the language movement was coincident with the Revival, and has undoubtedly strengthened it, the interaction of the two may best be studied in those writers who belonged to both, while primarily concerned with the restoration of Gaelic. In the field of translation George Sigerson may be said to occupy a position…
