Antoine Ó Raifteiri

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Antoine Ó Raifteiri (also Antoine Ó Reachtabhra, English: Anthony Raftery) (1784 – 1835) was an Irish language poet who is often called the last of the wandering bards.

[edit] Biography

A native of Kiltimagh, County Mayo, Ó Raifteiri was blinded by smallpox as a child. He lived by playing his fiddle and performing his songs and poems in the mansions of the Anglo-Irish gentry. His work draws on the forms and idiom of Irish folk poetry, and although it is conventionally regarded as marking the end of the literary tradition, Ó Raifteiri and his fellow poets did not see themselves in this way.^[1] None of his poems were written down during the poet's lifetime, but they were collected from those he taught them to by Douglas Hyde, Lady Gregory and others, who later published them.^[2]

Ó Raifteiri's most enduring poems include Eanach Dhuin, Cill Aodain which are still learned by Irish schoolchildren. Although many people think it is he who wrote ' "Mise Raifteirí an File" it was in fact written in America toward the end of the 19th C by Seán O Ceallaigh. The first four lines of Mise Raifteiri an File appeared on the reverse of the Series C Irish five pound note. They read-

Mise Raifteirí, an file,

lán dóchais is grá

le súile gan solas,

ciúineas gan crá

Dul siar ar mo aistear,

le solus mo Chroidhe,

Fann agus tuirseadh,

go deireadh mo shlighe

Feach anois mé 's

mo aghaidh ar bhalla,

Ag seinm ceoil

le pocaibh falamh.

ENGLISH TRANSLATION

I am Raftery the poet,

full of hope and love

Having eyes without sight,

lonely I rove.

Going on my journeying

by my heart's light

Weary and tired

of unending night.

Take a look at me now

with my back to a wall

Singing and playing

for nothing at all

Ó Raifteiri is buried at Rahasane, near Craughwell, County Galway.^[3]

[edit] References

1. ^ Denvir, Gearóid (1997). Litríocht agus Pobal. Cló Iar-Chonnacta. 
2. ^ Bartleby. http://www.bartleby.com/250/142.html Retrieved Feb. 24, 2007.
3. ^ [1] Princess Grace Irish Library. Retrieved Sep. 23, 2007.