Peig: The Autobiography of Peig Sayers of the Great Blasket Island

The autobiography of peig sayers is a well studied document in Irish education. It has just recently been taken out of the rotation of Irish language studies in favour of my contemporary works. It details the life of Peig Sayers, a woman who lives on of the Blasket islands off the coast of Ireland. She lived a traditional life despite her living in the 20th century. Living off the land is something that Irish people used to do a lot but did'nt anymore as society moved on, on the islands however, life remained fairly traditional with many seaweed farmers and fishermen living off the land. She gave birth to 11 children with her husband yet only six survived. She was one of the figure heads and face of the late Celtic revival which occurred in the early 1900's to around 1930 with artists such as WB Yeats and lady Agustus being notable members of.

I'm completely inspired by peig Sayers and her ability to remain traditional to Ireland's ancestory and heritage and not to succumb to England's violent attempts to ethnically cleanse us of our culture. She most definitely is not known for her fashion, but she dressed fairly traditionally for an Irish woman, a style that I would like to invoke in my work. I know many designers and artists have embraced traditional Ireland in design such as Lou Brennan, a mayo based designer whos creates silk scarves inspired by the women of Galway and their shawls.

Peig sayers was a feminist icon, if we can argue that Jane Austin and the Bronte’s were feminists then why not Peig. At the time, the education system was failing and she had not been taught to read and write in her native language. She held up the oral tradition of the Irish language and was able to dictate over 300 stories in her later years. Many scholars came to the blasket islands to detail the lives of these people and she was the most successful. Even within her hardships and her illiteracy, she went on to be one of the most prolific storytellers and folklorists in history. And yet you would be flat out trying to find an adult over the age of 30 that can’t hear the name Peig Sayers without a rolling of the eyes.
Peig managed to have a book published detailing the everyday life of a woman of that generation, a generation that would’ve been completely lost if it were not for members of the Celtic revival’s active effort to conserve these stories.
Culturally, we have a strange relationship with our own language, in which we want to preserve it yet so many people have excuses to evade facing it and learning it. The most common would be blaming the education system. Most grown adults in Ireland refused to learn irish and Peig would be some of their main reasons, her book ruined the fun of Irish for them.
The grips of colonisation stole our language and took our traditions, making Irish seem like a dusty language that deserves to be put on the shelf. It belongs on the islands and in the Gaeltachts and shouldn’t muster the courage to leave the lips of an urban person.
Peig is seen as a negative symbol for the Irish language but deserves to be reclaimed as an icon of Ireland’s feminine history deep rooted in nationalism and anti-colonisation. Bringing Ireland back to the cultural haven of the past.

Part 3 Research

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