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Trinity's Berkeley Library to be named after Eavan Boland

  • 09-10-2024 1:54pm
    #1
    Registered Users, Registered Users 2 Posts: 544 ✭✭✭


    The Trinity Library, previously named after renowned philosopher and slave owner George Berkely is to be renamed after the poet Eavan Boland.

    Renowned in Ireland as someone whose works have featured frequently on the Leaving Cert course I doubt if her oeuvre is as well known outside these shores. But she ticks the boxes.

    She went to Trinity.

    She was a woman.

    She didn't own slaves.

    She wrote about "Irish identity".

    Can't think of any other reasons why she might have been so honoured. Any of her poems I've read have moved nothing in me other than a yawn. But maybe I'm just out of touch with the modern zeitgeist.



«134

Comments

  • Registered Users, Registered Users 2 Posts: 4,414 ✭✭✭eightieschewbaccy


    She's very much so well known on a global scale, even got inducted into the American Academy of Arts and Sciences. Won plenty of prizes in poetry and would be a pretty renowned poet globally. So yep, she's very much so a pretty notable Irish figure and not known just because of leaving cert poetry. Given the fact we're very much so a country known for our literary talents, think it's a pretty good choice.



  • Moderators, Category Moderators, Science, Health & Environment Moderators, Social & Fun Moderators, Society & Culture Moderators Posts: 40,552 CMod ✭✭✭✭ancapailldorcha


    Good move from my alma mater. I don't know if there was a campaign behind it but if so, I am not aware. We shouldn't be venerating slaveowners by naming things after them.

    In April 2023, TCD decided to remove George Berkeley’s name from its main library because of the Irish philosopher’s association with slavery. Since this ‘denaming’, its largest library has been known simply as The Library.

    This decision was made on the basis that the continued use of Berkeley’s name was “inconsistent with the university’s core values of human dignity, freedom, inclusivity and equality”.

    Trinity Legacies Review Working Group, established by the college in November 2022 in an effort “to contextualise and historicise the university’s deep links to colonialism” took into consideration “evidence-based submissions”, which were open to the public, on the naming of the library.

    https://www.irishtimes.com/ireland/education/2024/10/09/trinity-college-dublin-renames-former-berkeley-library-after-poet-eavan-boland/

    Good to see them being proactive about this.

    The foreigner residing among you must be treated as your native-born. Love them as yourself, for you were foreigners in Egypt. I am the LORD your God.

    Leviticus 19:34



  • Registered Users, Registered Users 2 Posts: 4,063 ✭✭✭...Ghost...


    Eavan who?

    Nobody outside of the box ticking diversity group will care about this. The Berkeley library will still be known as the Berkeley library, or Main Library. The new name won't stick, save for the name plate it's etched on.

    Stay Free



  • Registered Users, Registered Users 2 Posts: 16,130 ✭✭✭✭elperello


    Excellent choice.

    A fitting tribute to woman who was an important and authentic female voice in Irish literature.

    https://www.tcd.ie/news_events/top-stories/featured/trinity-renaming/



  • Registered Users, Registered Users 2 Posts: 17,709 ✭✭✭✭Mr. CooL ICE


    She was the one poet that I studied for and she came up in my LC in 2002 despite my teacher convincing us all to focus on Heaney. So I fully support this. Gwan the Boland.



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  • Moderators, Category Moderators, Science, Health & Environment Moderators, Social & Fun Moderators, Society & Culture Moderators Posts: 40,552 CMod ✭✭✭✭ancapailldorcha


    She was an acclaimed poet. Plenty of people care, obviously. I doubt Trinity's staff and academics are going to exert themselves to whitewash the memory of a slaver.

    The foreigner residing among you must be treated as your native-born. Love them as yourself, for you were foreigners in Egypt. I am the LORD your God.

    Leviticus 19:34



  • Registered Users, Registered Users 2 Posts: 4,414 ✭✭✭eightieschewbaccy


    It just comes across as ignorant to pretend as if she was a nobody. Obama quoted her on his visit here, Biden quoted her last year. The New York Times, New Yorker, Washington Post, Economy and other publications across the globe ran obituaries upon her death. So you might somehow be oblivious to her but she was a significant figure in poetry and should very much so be celebrated as such.

    I didn't realise posters were such avid fans of the philosophical works of Berkeley.... 😂



  • Registered Users, Registered Users 2 Posts: 1,902 ✭✭✭TokTik


    If they did a vox-pop on Grafton St asking people about it, 99% of people would say “who”?



  • Moderators, Category Moderators, Science, Health & Environment Moderators, Social & Fun Moderators, Society & Culture Moderators Posts: 40,552 CMod ✭✭✭✭ancapailldorcha


    The foreigner residing among you must be treated as your native-born. Love them as yourself, for you were foreigners in Egypt. I am the LORD your God.

    Leviticus 19:34



  • Registered Users, Registered Users 2 Posts: 13,616 ✭✭✭✭ArmaniJeanss


    Yeah, pretty much the same way everyone still calls it Sackville St, despite the name plates saying O'Connell St.

    Post edited by ArmaniJeanss on


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  • Registered Users, Registered Users 2 Posts: 7,014 ✭✭✭Allinall


    99% of people on Grafton Street don't go to Trinity, so not sure how your survey would be in any way relevant.



  • Registered Users, Registered Users 2 Posts: 1,902 ✭✭✭TokTik




  • Moderators, Category Moderators, Science, Health & Environment Moderators, Social & Fun Moderators, Society & Culture Moderators Posts: 40,552 CMod ✭✭✭✭ancapailldorcha


    She's not obscure. I recall studying her in English and she won acclaim worldwide.

    The foreigner residing among you must be treated as your native-born. Love them as yourself, for you were foreigners in Egypt. I am the LORD your God.

    Leviticus 19:34



  • Registered Users, Registered Users 2 Posts: 7,988 ✭✭✭Oscar_Madison


    I guess you get used to a name - be it a bridge, a train station or in this case a library.

    in 1966 Amiens st station was renamed Connolly Station and Kingsbridge to Heuston station.

    I wasn’t alive at this time but years later I’d often hear my parents say Amiens or Kingsbridge when referring to the stations - something you probably wouldn’t hear happen anymore now .

    Reckon the staff will keep referring to it as Berkeley till they retire but any new students entering the college will likely refer to its new name.

    It’s probably not a bad idea to consider a few other building or bridge name changes etc to commemorate more contemporary people who have contributed to Irish society but what I wouldn’t like to see is a complete eradication of history either no matter how disturbing it may be



  • Registered Users, Registered Users 2 Posts: 4,414 ✭✭✭eightieschewbaccy


    I'd doubt that tbh, she only died in the last few years. There's been documentaries about her, she was quoted by Obama when he visited here. Anyone who reads would be familiar with Costa Book awards, she won one posthumously in 2020. Plus she's in the leaving cert so she's as well known as Seamus Heaney for anyone who did their leaving.

    Do you think a vox-pop would find a huge familiarity with George Berkeley on the streets? 😂



  • Registered Users, Registered Users 2 Posts: 1,902 ✭✭✭TokTik


    I did my Higher Level English in my Leaving and today is the first I’ve heard of her.



  • Registered Users, Registered Users 2 Posts: 4,414 ✭✭✭eightieschewbaccy


    And? Maybe she wasn't on the syllabus that year. In terms of you having never heard of her, think this is more a case of you priding yourself on your ignorance more than anything.

    She would be considered among the best Irish poets in the 20th and 21st century. That would put her up there with Seamus Heaney, Patrick Kavanagh, Yeats. And that's not just my opinion. Unknown niche Irish poets don't manage to get obituaries in major News Publications in the UK and US. 😂



  • Registered Users, Registered Users 2 Posts: 4,892 ✭✭✭silliussoddius


    There's a Berkeley library?



  • Moderators, Category Moderators, Science, Health & Environment Moderators, Social & Fun Moderators, Society & Culture Moderators Posts: 40,552 CMod ✭✭✭✭ancapailldorcha


    There was.

    I never used it as I did a STEM degree so I was always in the Hamilton and the Pav.

    The foreigner residing among you must be treated as your native-born. Love them as yourself, for you were foreigners in Egypt. I am the LORD your God.

    Leviticus 19:34



  • Registered Users, Registered Users 2 Posts: 1,748 ✭✭✭kabakuyu


    At least they didn't name it after mickey D.



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  • Registered Users, Registered Users 2 Posts: 2,349 ✭✭✭sprucemoose


    id say the average irish person would be much more likely to know who boland is compared to berkeley, seeing as she is one of ireland's most famous poets and is regularly one of the poets on the leaving cert english syllabus.

    but yeah, its all about 'box ticking diversity'…….

    Post edited by sprucemoose on


  • Registered Users, Registered Users 2 Posts: 792 ✭✭✭Yeah Right


    "I've never heard of her, so I'm gonna assume that everyone else is just as ignorant as me, even though I never knew who Berkely was either"

    Fixed that for you



  • Registered Users, Registered Users 2 Posts: 544 ✭✭✭Madd Finn


    I have heard of her, but only because I came across some of her poems that were on my daughter's Leaving Cert syllabus some years back and I looked them over in a "what are they teaching our kids nowadays?" fit of curiosity. One was called Famine Road and the other was some musings about her daughter's bedroom.

    Neither a page turner for me, but then art is always subjective.

    What are her good poems?



  • Registered Users, Registered Users 2 Posts: 7,755 ✭✭✭MrMusician18




  • Moderators, Category Moderators, Science, Health & Environment Moderators, Social & Fun Moderators, Society & Culture Moderators Posts: 40,552 CMod ✭✭✭✭ancapailldorcha


    In the context of this news, why do you find the idea of a slaver more palatable than one of Ireland's most prominent artists?

    The foreigner residing among you must be treated as your native-born. Love them as yourself, for you were foreigners in Egypt. I am the LORD your God.

    Leviticus 19:34



  • Registered Users, Registered Users 2 Posts: 9,433 ✭✭✭Quantum Erasure


    Trinity Legacies Review Working Group, established by the college in November 2022 in an effort “to contextualise and historicise the university’sdeep links to colonialism” 

    👀



  • Registered Users, Registered Users 2 Posts: 4,126 ✭✭✭NewbridgeIR


    Eavan Boland is good choice, always liked her poetry. Pity she didn't live to see it - would only have been 80 this year.



  • Moderators, Category Moderators, Science, Health & Environment Moderators, Social & Fun Moderators, Society & Culture Moderators Posts: 40,552 CMod ✭✭✭✭ancapailldorcha


    The foreigner residing among you must be treated as your native-born. Love them as yourself, for you were foreigners in Egypt. I am the LORD your God.

    Leviticus 19:34



  • Registered Users, Registered Users 2 Posts: 4,892 ✭✭✭silliussoddius


    The entire college has deep links to colonialism, didn't papists face a lot of restrictions. What will the working group do to contextualise and historicise that?

    I think it just reeks of of some luvvies sitting around patting themselves on the back for a job well done. Who knows, in a hundred years the group might find some dirt on Boland and re-name it.



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  • Registered Users, Registered Users 2 Posts: 6,390 ✭✭✭Cordell


    This is stupid. People like him are remembered and celebrated for their achievements, in spite of their shortcomings because the good they did greatly outweighs any (real or perceived) bad. It's like the removal of those statues from that hotel, removing and destroying art and legacy in the name of ideology - I wonder who else do that?

    I'm not saying that Eavan Boland doesn't deserve the honor, what I'm saying is that George Berkley doesn't deserve this disgrace.



  • Moderators, Category Moderators, Science, Health & Environment Moderators, Social & Fun Moderators, Society & Culture Moderators Posts: 40,552 CMod ✭✭✭✭ancapailldorcha


    It's always funny how people get upset by things like this.

    Trinity was founded by Queen Elizabeth I in 1592 and was an Anglican-only establishment for most of its history. I'd be incredibly surprised if it didn't have deep links to colonialism.

    The foreigner residing among you must be treated as your native-born. Love them as yourself, for you were foreigners in Egypt. I am the LORD your God.

    Leviticus 19:34



  • Moderators, Category Moderators, Science, Health & Environment Moderators, Social & Fun Moderators, Society & Culture Moderators Posts: 40,552 CMod ✭✭✭✭ancapailldorcha


    It's not really a disgrace and he shouldn't have anything named after him.

    The foreigner residing among you must be treated as your native-born. Love them as yourself, for you were foreigners in Egypt. I am the LORD your God.

    Leviticus 19:34



  • Registered Users, Registered Users 2 Posts: 4,892 ✭✭✭silliussoddius


    I'm not getting upset, I just think it's like slacktivism.



  • Moderators, Category Moderators, Science, Health & Environment Moderators, Social & Fun Moderators, Society & Culture Moderators Posts: 40,552 CMod ✭✭✭✭ancapailldorcha


    How? There was meeting in the University and the change was decided. No activists involved as far as I can see.

    The foreigner residing among you must be treated as your native-born. Love them as yourself, for you were foreigners in Egypt. I am the LORD your God.

    Leviticus 19:34



  • Registered Users, Registered Users 2 Posts: 4,063 ✭✭✭...Ghost...


    Stay Free



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  • Registered Users, Registered Users 2 Posts: 4,063 ✭✭✭...Ghost...


    Never heard of her. I'm not into poetry and I couldn't care less what they call a library. What is bothersome is the fuss over nothing and the shoe-horning of who I am sure was a great woman onto a name plate to placate whining students and staff with no left legs. I don't see them going after VW for a renaming considering its direct association with the most evil man in recent history. Could be that he didn't like Jews.

    Stay Free



  • Moderators, Category Moderators, Science, Health & Environment Moderators, Social & Fun Moderators, Society & Culture Moderators Posts: 40,552 CMod ✭✭✭✭ancapailldorcha


    It's telling that the people upset at this keep trotting out exactly the same lines despite them having no relevance. There was no discernible fuss or activists or anything like that.

    The antisemitism isn't helping, honestly.

    The foreigner residing among you must be treated as your native-born. Love them as yourself, for you were foreigners in Egypt. I am the LORD your God.

    Leviticus 19:34



  • Registered Users, Registered Users 2 Posts: 4,063 ✭✭✭...Ghost...


    Really? A protest is no longer a fuss. Times are a changin'

    You see no connection with Mr. H (VW), or anti-semitism? You must have missed this bit

    SOURCE

    https://trinitynews.ie/2024/05/protestors-rebrand-former-berkeley-library-in-honour-of-slain-palestinian-poet/

    Stay Free



  • Moderators, Category Moderators, Science, Health & Environment Moderators, Social & Fun Moderators, Society & Culture Moderators Posts: 40,552 CMod ✭✭✭✭ancapailldorcha


    The foreigner residing among you must be treated as your native-born. Love them as yourself, for you were foreigners in Egypt. I am the LORD your God.

    Leviticus 19:34



  • Registered Users, Registered Users 2 Posts: 3,603 ✭✭✭Mal-Adjusted


    Never heard of either of them. I really don't see what the problem is. It's their building, they can rename it if they want. I'm just happy they haven't gone down the road if naming things after corporate donors yet, waiting for the Allianz library.



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  • Moderators, Business & Finance Moderators Posts: 10,613 Mod ✭✭✭✭Jim2007


    She is widely known, seems you need to update your knowledge of modern Irish literature…. or may be find a different set of box tickers to hang out with……



  • Registered Users, Registered Users 2 Posts: 4,063 ✭✭✭...Ghost...


    You said

    I doubt Trinity's staff and academics are going to exert themselves to whitewash the memory of a slaver.

    I said that I find it bothersome that Students and Staff shoe-horned a name onto a famous Library by whining…referring to their protests and petitions.

    I pointed to the hypocrisy that VW hasn't been re-named despite its history and connection with Hitler.

    By the way, I'm not suggesting it should be re-named.

    Hitler famously killed more than a few Jews incase you didn't know. The connection you are missing is the single sided and blinkered view held by the Students and to a large extent, the Staff at Trinity college in relation to the ongoing war in Gaza.

    I linked an inside Trinity Newspaper story to connect the dots for you. By the way, Mr Alareer condoned the Hamas massacre on October 7th in a BBC interview. This is the "poet" the Students wanted to commend as a hero.

    Do you still stand by your statement which I quoted above about lack of exertion by Trinity et al?

    Stay Free



  • Registered Users, Registered Users 2 Posts: 6,790 ✭✭✭Feisar


    Since the university was founded by Elizabeth the 1st, a slaver, surely they should rename Trinity?

    First they came for the socialists...



  • Registered Users, Registered Users 2 Posts: 4,063 ✭✭✭...Ghost...


    Why do I need to do this? I have no interest in modern Irish literature. Almost all the box ticking was done in the re-naming project it seems. Not many boxes left.

    Stay Free



  • Registered Users, Registered Users 2 Posts: 4,063 ✭✭✭...Ghost...


    They might have recovered some of their lost revenue from when the protesters last barricaded themselves in and blocked off the BoK. 😊

    Stay Free



  • Registered Users, Registered Users 2 Posts: 4,414 ✭✭✭eightieschewbaccy


    The university decided to change the name last year, the article you linked is from May. It had nothing to do with the name change.

    In relation to Gaza, most Irish people are not happy with Israel killing a huge number of civilians on a daily basis. There are plenty of Jewish people who have an issue with it too.

    But I will concede, I fully support renaming the Henry Ford Library in Trinity... Most would.

    In fairness, you and a few other posters have tried to claim she's a nobody.



  • Registered Users, Registered Users 2 Posts: 9,138 ✭✭✭Gregor Samsa


    Still probably more than know who George Berkeley is.

    Either way, a university library doesn’t need to be named after someone with pop culture credentials. Boland is an eminently appropriate choice.



  • Moderators, Category Moderators, Science, Health & Environment Moderators, Social & Fun Moderators, Society & Culture Moderators Posts: 40,552 CMod ✭✭✭✭ancapailldorcha


    In other words, you're trying to derail the thread because you can't make an argument that the library should retain the name of a slave trader.

    There is no hypocrisy. What have you done to get VW renamed? Have you started a pressure group? Lobbying? Or do you not care?

    The foreigner residing among you must be treated as your native-born. Love them as yourself, for you were foreigners in Egypt. I am the LORD your God.

    Leviticus 19:34



  • Moderators, Category Moderators, Science, Health & Environment Moderators, Social & Fun Moderators, Society & Culture Moderators Posts: 40,552 CMod ✭✭✭✭ancapailldorcha


    The foreigner residing among you must be treated as your native-born. Love them as yourself, for you were foreigners in Egypt. I am the LORD your God.

    Leviticus 19:34



  • Registered Users, Registered Users 2 Posts: 24,621 ✭✭✭✭pjohnson


    Has Dublin gone that far backward now 99% of people haven't done the Leaving Cert?



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