Broderick - Wild Irish Women: Extraordinary Lives from History

With all the presumption of the truly underqualified, I decided to write this book because I felt that my two favourite subjects Irish history and womens studies did not meet up often enough. The place of Irish women in history, or any women in any history for that matter, has been largely ignored. My intention is that this collection should go some small way to redress the balance.

There are three criteria for inclusion in this collection. The first is that these women are all fascinating. Although not necessarily the wild Irish girls of Sydney Owensons famous novel, to which the title of this book refers, they are certainly women who broke the rules in days when rule-breaking was riskier than it is today. Most were unselfconscious about this, the very last thing on their minds a desire to be seen as pioneering women. Some, however, were unashamed limelight-lovers who, far from being mugged by Fate, were only too aware of their moments of destiny and enjoyed them to the full.

The second criterion is an Irish connection, and as one might expect from a London-Irish author, this can be pretty tenuous. Though most of the women in the book are Irish-born and bred, there are those, like myself, who merely limp in with an Irish background. The Irishness of my women is variously and liberally mixed and diluted with the cultures of Europe, the USA, South America, the Caribbean, Japan and Australasia. (Then theres Katherine Parnell, whos just plain English!)

Lastly, it should be obvious that, since this is a historical collection, none of the women in this book is living although the redoubtable Old Countess of Desmond might well be had she not fallen out of a tree at age 140. Although cynics might suggest that my decision to write only about dead women is not entirely unconnected with libel law, it would be more accurate to cite the calibre of the increasing number of women alive today that are represented in politics, public life, arts and entertainment. Once started on some of these women, it would be difficult to know when to stop and this would be a completely different book.

The women in this collection enjoy varying degrees of fame, or notoriety . Some, such as Countess Markievicz and Sarah Purser, are famous in their own right. Others bear household names, such as Yeats, Wilde and Parnell, yet remain shadowy figures. Who would think of the artistic sisters Lily and Lolly Yeats before their genius brother William Butler, even though WBs early poems would never have been written without his sisters financial support? Similarly, who would think of the brilliant and deeply eccentric Lady Jane Wilde instead of Oscar, even though his celebrated style and wit was based largely on hers?

I have balanced the famous names in the book with the inclusion of some little-known but colourful characters. These include Biddy Early, animal-healer and poteen-drinker extraordinaire; Lady Betty, murderer and public executioner; the cross-dressing soldier Kit Cavanagh; and Irelands last changeling, Bridget Cleary.

The response to the first edition showed that the stories of these and all the other women in the book still have the power to engage. Wild IrishWomen is a book of stories heroic, farcical, shocking, inspiring and tragic and at the centre of each is a real, breathing, living woman. Alexander Pope held the view that most women have no characters at all, but I hope these stories demonstrate the opposite.

Marian Broderick

August 2002

I am ambitious, yet the strongest point of my ambition is to be every inch a woman.

Lady Sydney Morgan