Last year marked the 700th anniversary of the death of the Italian poet Dante, an occasion celebrated throughout Italy with open-air readings, on-line conferences and the publication of books and papers. What isn’t perhaps widely known is that an inspiration for the first book of his Divine Comedy is a legend associated with the cave (since destroyed) known as St Patrick’s Purgatory, on Station Island, Lough Derg.
In the year 1607 we had the historic Flight of the Earls, an event which opened the door for the Plantation of Ulster and the sad consequences that followed. In the early 1980's the late Liam Reilly, lyricist and performer, wrote about another flight of earls. His song was a lament for the departure of our many young people who were departing these shores due to a poor economy and consequent lack of opportunity.
When we imagine the Irish diaspora we cannot help but be brought back to one of the most traumatic times in our history. The Great Famine of 1845 resulted in death, malnutrition and mass emigration, reducing the population dramatically; Ireland's population fell from almost 8.4 million in 1844 to 6.6 million by 1851. About 1 million people died and perhaps 2 million more eventually emigrated from the country. When faced with shocking statistics like this many things come to mind, the first being erroneous British policy over consecutive years.
