Launching the campaign against Arts cuts on Morning Ireland yesterday, Colm Toibin asked the presenters to name a writer from The Cayman Islands (ummmm.... not coming up with anyone), or from Austria. Well, Austria has a few. But us, we are steeped in the good fortune to be synonymous internationally with James Joyce, Samuel Beckett, Brian Friel, JM Synge, WB Yeats, Marina Carr, Kate O'Brien, Flann O'Brien, Martin McDonagh, the list goes on. And on and on... Money couldn't buy good publicity like that for "brand Ireland". Who has poor Iceland got, to change the international focus from their financial blunders? And as Toibin astutely pointed out, Irish writers, and the Irish Arts, unlike the church, the bankers (and so on), have never let us down. So where is the logic in now letting the Arts down, our best Ambassador, with crippling cuts? Let's stay synonymous with those great names, and keep them coming, by supporting the campaign against Arts Cuts. Because that would be cutting off our nose despite our face...
Here is my point in response to the report on the Morning Ireland site:
23/09/2009 10:14:25 Deirdre Mulrooney
In answer to your question - Ingeborg Bachmann is a lovely writer from Austria - I'm surprised Colm Toibin doesn't know of her work. For example "The Thirtieth Year" - well worth a read. However I absolutely agree with Colm Toibin's sentiments this morning on your show. The Arts are simply the goose with the golden eggs for this country. Don't kill the goose!
http://www.rte.ie/news/morningireland/totheeditor.html
& here is a link to the campaign - join right now!:
http://www.ncfa.ie/
and:
http://nationalcampaignforthearts.wordpress.com
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It's the dawning of the age of Aquarius - like that old song from "Hair"- we are increasingly measuring the success of our society by women's standards. In other words, how happy and creative and communicative we are as a society is a more meaningful measurement than that old macho bugbear, Gross Domestic Product! Our government is failing to value the things that really mean something to us - health, education, the arts - and instead is focused on all those competitive macho indicators like who has the most money, cars, property, and face-time with other competitors to strut like cockerels at Davos and the rest. Perhaps the arts will be more inventive and effective in communicating these kinds of protests to a larger audience than those weaker people lying in the neglected hospitals of this country! Keep it up, Deirdre! End of rant. :-P
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