Cover

Abstract

COVER 200 COVER COLIN IRELAND AND MARIA TYMOCZKO “The Watcher,” Paul Henry. The illustration featured on the cover of this volume is a painting by Paul Henry (1876–1958) called “The Watcher.” It was completed during the period in his life when he lived on Achill Island (1910–19) and was first exhibited in Belfast in 1911. Henry’s landscape paintings of the West of Ireland have become iconic for many who view the West as the “real” Ireland : pure, romantic, Gaelic, and Catholic. Henry was enthralled by Achill and most critics accept that his sojourn there defined his career, yet Henry was himself born in Belfast, the son of a Protestant clergyman. Henry’s painting encapsulates many of the questions and dilemmas called forth in this volume on “language and identity.” We see a peasant woman dressed in the traditional red skirt, her feet planted firmly on the boulders of the western seaboard, gazing pensively into the stormy, cloudy Atlantic. She is clearly grounded in time and place, yet she ponders the unknown. The artist has made no attempt at portraiture; no details of her face are visible. So, who is this woman? Her left hand covers her mouth. What language does she speak? Will the language that she speaks to us be the same one that molds her thoughts? The cloudy expanse of sea that she contemplates is full of ambiguity and uncertainty. Is she waiting for someone to come? Or is she considering leaving? The western seaboard had already experienced generations of emigration and would experience several generations more. And how could her generation have anticipated the immigration and asylum seekers that Ireland has seen over the last decade? This painting was recently exhibited at the retrospective for Paul Henry at the National Gallery of Ireland (19 February–18 May 2003). It is from a private collection and appears on the cover of this volume courtesy of Pyms Gallery, London. We wish to thank Alan Hobart of Pyms Gallery for his assistance in securing permission to reproduce this painting for our cover. We also thank Síghle Bhreathnach-Lynch of the National Gallery of Ireland for her advice and help in this process. ...