Monday, June 16, 2008

nuala o'faolain

here is a transcription of a cutting sent by the mother of the ravaj with the comment "how far the times has come". it is from the past month, but there is no date on it. it is in the 'lives remembered' section:

"nell mccafferty writes: your obituary of nuala o'faolain (may 21) declares that she had a 'lesbian affair' with me and 'romances with men'. please explain how you arrived at the conclusion that love between two women is not romantic and that living together for 15 years, as nuala and i did, is a mere 'affair'.

also, you write that she had 'sexual encounters' with a lorry driver and a jewish lawyer. you do not state if the lorry driver and the lawyer were female or male.

you describe me as being 'a militant journalist from the bogside, the catholic area of the city of londonderry'. what exactly does a militant journalist do - hold a petrol bomb in one hand and a computer mouse in the other?

you say that i was a 'fellow columnist' of nuala's. now there, sir, you have really gone too far. i am no fellow.

nuala was, as we say in gaeilge, 'mo bhean cheile' - the woman of my togetherness, a term that existed in ireland thousands of years before the invention of the institution of marriage, and the later imposition of the english language, which translated it as 'wife'. (i am not trying to start another war here, between sexes or countries. brian friel's play 'translations' will explain all.)

your description of nuala's life has left me quite exhausted, trying to figure out what exactly you were trying to tell readers.

allow me to guide you. did the deceased consider herself or himself beloved? the beloved nuala and i loved each other, for quite some time, in the ordinary way of two people."

interview with marian finucane 1 month before nuala died.
newspaper report on funeral mass

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