# List of Trinity College Dublin people

This is a list of notable alumni and faculty members of Trinity College Dublin.

## Armed forces

* Tom Clonan, retired Irish Army officer, author and security analyst
* Eyre Coote (1762–1823), Irish British Army soldier and politician; Governor-General of Jamaica (1806–1808)
* Henry George Gore-Browne (1830–1912), Irish British Army colonial of the 100th Regiment of Foot; awarded the Victoria Cross (circa 1857, while a captain of the 32nd Regiment of Foot)
* James Murray Irwin (1858–1938), Irish British Army major-general doctor
* Col. Ernest Achey Loftus, CBE, soldier, teacher and diarist
* Michael Lynch, MMG (1942–2008), Irish Army officer and recipient of the Military Medal for Gallantry
* Robert Nairac (1948–1977), English British Army captain; abducted and killed by the Provisional Irish Republican Army in 1977; posthumously awarded the George Cross (1979)
* Robert Ross (1766–1814), Anglo-Irish British Army officer; participated in the Napoleonic Wars (various ranks); commander of the British force which sacked Washington, D.C., and burned down the White House, during the War of 1812 (as major-general)
* Sir Hovenden Walker (1656/1666–1725/1728), Royal Navy officer

## Arts

* Lenny Abrahamson, Oscar-nominated film director
* Thomas Bateson, 17th-century writer of madrigals
* Aisling Bea, actress and comedian
* Cathy Belton, actress
* John Butler Yeats, artist
* David Benioff, filmmaker and co-creator of Game of Thrones
* Michael Bogdanov, theatre director
* Sammy Copley, singer and musician
* Derbhle Crotty, actress
* Brian Boydell, composer
* Selina Cartmell, theatre director, and director of the Gate Theatre
* Lou Caubet, Queen of the Swag
* Michael Colgan, director of the Gate Theatre, film and television producer
* Houston Collisson, musician
* Anne Crookshank, emeritus professor of the history of art and founder of the faculty
* Chris de Burgh, singer and musician
* Thomas Manly Deane, architect
* Pádraic Delaney, actor
* Donnacha Dennehy, composer
* Ciarán Farrell, composer
* Margaret Fiedler, musician and singer
* Susan Fitzgerald, actress
* Percy French, songwriter and entertainer
* Jack Gleeson, actor
* Constantine Gregory, actor
* Lisa Hannigan, singer
* Aaron Heffernan, actor
* Rachael Hegarty, poet
* Ciaran Hope, composer of orchestral, choral, and film music
* Andrew Hozier-Byrne, singer-songwriter (did not finish course)
* Fergus Johnston, composer
* Dillie Keane, singer-songwriter and actress
* Lisa Lambe, actress and singer
* Nathaniel Lande, author, filmmaker and former creative director of Time
* Jacknife Lee, record producer
* Allen Leech, actor
* Damien Leith, singer
* Eleanor McEvoy, singer-songwriter
* Katie McGrath, actress
* Sean Pol McGreevy, actor/musician
* Paul McGuinness, manager of U2
* Pauline McLynn, actress, comedian and novelist
* Katie McMahon, singer and musician
* Ruth Negga, actress
* Jonathon Ng, musician
* Méav Ní Mhaolchatha, singer
* Sylvia O'Brien, opera singer
* David O'Doherty, comedian
* Rebecca O'Mara, actress
* Matthew Pilkington, satirist and art historian
* Laura Pyper, actress
* Norman Rodway, actor
* James Edward Rogers, architect and artist
* Andrew Scott, actor
* Chris Singleton, singer-songwriter and producer
* Max Stafford-Clark, theatre director
* Rhys Thomas, film and television director
* Stanley Townsend, actor
* Tom Vaughan-Lawlor, actor
* D. B. Weiss, novelist and co-creator of Game of Thrones
* Garret Wesley, 1st Earl of Mornington, composer, father of the Duke of Wellington
* Dominic West, British actor
* Ian Whitcomb, singer and entertainer
* James White, historical novelist
* Paul Mescal, actor

## Broadcasting and journalism

* Bruce Arnold, journalist and author
* Sharon Ní Bheoláin, news presenter
* James David Bourchier, Balkans correspondent for The Times and advisor to Tzar Ferdinand of Bulgaria
* John Bowman, journalist and broadcaster
* Rory Carroll, US West Coast correspondent, The Guardian
* Tony Connelly, Europe Editor, RTÉ
* Crosaire (J. D. Crozier), B.A. Dubl 1940, compiled the cryptic crossword for The Irish Times for fifty-nine years
* Ray D'Arcy, television and radio presenter
* Joe Duffy, radio presenter
* Maia Dunphy, broadcaster
* Ken Early, soccer journalist
* Robert Fisk, journalist
* Douglas Gageby, editor of the Irish Times
* Veronica Guerin, crime reporter
* Charles Graham Halpine, journalist
* Vincent Hanna, Northern Irish television journalist
* Brian Inglis, journalist, historian and television presenter
* Mary Jordan, Pulitzer Prize-winning journalist
* Aine Lawlor, radio and television presenter
* Quentin Letts, British columnist and theatre critic
* Martyn Lewis, British newsreader and journalist
* Mark Little, journalist
* Alex Massie, freelance journalist
* David McWilliams, writer and broadcaster on economic and social issues
* Denis Murray OBE former BBC Ireland Correspondent.
* Edmund O'Donovan, war correspondent
* Rupert Pennant-Rea, former editor of The Economist
* Gerry Ryan, radio presenter
* Cliff Taylor, editor, Sunday Business Post
* Nick Webb, Business Editor, Sunday Independent

## Business

* Conrad Burke, physicist and entrepreneur
* Paul Coulson
* Olivia Grosvenor, Duchess of Westminster, senior account manager
* Lord Haskins of Skidby, chairman of Northern Foods
* Alan Joyce, chief executive of Qantas
* Laura Magahy, company director and former director of Sláintecare
* Dermot Mannion, former chief executive of Aer Lingus
* Michael O'Leary, chief executive of Ryanair
* Willie Walsh, chief executive of British Airways

## Economics

* Sean Barrett, economist and member of Seanad Éireann
* Peter Bellew, chief executive of Malaysia Airlines
* Phelim Boyle (born 1941), academic and economist; pioneer of the use of Monte Carlo methods in derivatives pricing
* George Alexander Duncan (1902–2006), professor of political economy
* Francis Ysidro Edgeworth (1845–1926), philosopher and political economist
* Morgan Kelly, professor of economics, University College Dublin
* Philip R. Lane (born 1969), academic and economist
* Kevin O'Rourke, Professor of Economic History, Oxford

## Education

* Robert Blackburn, International Secretary of the United World Colleges; Deputy Director General of the International Baccalaureate
* Increase Mather, seventh president of Harvard University
* McFadden Alexander Newell, first principal of Maryland State Normal School (Towson University)
* Ferdinand von Prondzynski, president of Dublin City University
* Louise Richardson, former executive dean of Radcliffe Institute for Advanced Study; political scientist at Harvard University; Principal of the University of St Andrews; first female Vice-Chancellor of the University of Oxford as of 1 Jan 2016

## Science, mathematics, engineering and medicine

* Beulah Bewley, public health physician
* Denis Parsons Burkitt, surgeon and researcher into childhood cancer (cf. Burkitt's lymphoma)
* William C. Campbell, Nobel Prize in Physiology or Medicine 2015
* Georgia Chenevix-Trench, cancer researcher
* Aeneas Coffey, engineer, inventor of the Coffey still
* Steven Collins, co-founder of Havok
* Dimitri Leonidas Contostavlos, physician, forensic pathologist
* Andrew Hope Davidson, physician and Master of the Rotunda Hospital
* George Francis FitzGerald, professor of physics
* Gordon Foster (1920–2010), fellow emeritus at the college; Professor of Statistics and Dean of the Faculty of Engineering and statistics; author of the International Standard Book Number (ISBN) system (a global standard), and the book Information Technology in Developing Countries
* Aoife Gowen, researcher and professor
* Oliver St John Gogarty, physician and ear surgeon
* Alexander Henry Haliday, entomologist
* Hugh Hamilton, professor of natural philosophy
* William Rowan Hamilton, mathematician
* William Henry Harvey, botanist
* William Charles Hood, physician
* Caroline Hussey, microbiologist
* Werner Israel, physicist
* John Joly, physicist and geologist
* Sir John MacNeill, civil engineer
* Robert Mallet, engineer and scientist
* Una Martin, Clinical Pharmacologist
* Richard Maunsell, Chief Mechanical Engineer, South Eastern and Chatham Railway, and Southern Railway
* Henry Benedict Medlicott, geologist
* William Molyneux, natural philosopher
* Suzanne O'Sullivan, neurologist, prizewinning writer
* Charles Algernon Parsons, engineer, inventor of the modern steam turbine
* Thomas Preston, scientist
* Ouida Ramón-Moliner, anaesthetist
* Michael Roberts, mathematician
* William Johnson Sollas, geologist and anthropologist
* William Stokes, physician and professor
* George Johnstone Stoney, physicist who proposed the term 'electron' for the fundamental unit of electricity
* Jane Stout, ecologist and entomologist
* John Lighton Synge, mathematician and scientist
* Charles Hawkes Todd, physician, professor, and president of the Royal College of Surgeons
* Robert Bentley Todd, physician, Kings College professor, and identified with Todd's palsy
* Edward Hutchinson Synge, Irish physicist and nanoscience pioneer
* Ernest Walton, Nobel Prize winner
* Benjamin Worsley, 17th-century physician, surveyor and alchemist
* Peter Wyse Jackson, botanist
* Valerie O'Leary, scientist and researcher

## Humanities

* James Auchmuty, historian, wartime MI6 propagandist and inaugural vice-chancellor of the University of Newcastle, Australia
* Jonathan Bardon, historian
* George Berkeley, philosopher (cf. subjective idealism)
* Turtle Bunbury, historian and author
* J. B. Bury, Irish historian and classicist
* Anna Chahoud, Latin philologist
* Edward Courtney, scholar of Latin literature
* John Cruickshank, scholar of French literature, language, and culture
* Edward Dowden, Shakespearean scholar
* Sorcha Ní Fhlainn, academic specializing in vampire fiction, horror film, and gothic studies
* Roy Foster, Carroll Professor of Irish History, Hertford College, Oxford
* Ian Graham (BSc 1951), Mayanist archaeologist
* Edward Hincks, Orientalist
* Linda Hogan, fellow and Professor of Ecumenics
* Declan Kiberd, Professor of Anglo-Irish Literature, University College Dublin
* R. J. B. Knight, naval historian
* Richard Layte, Professor of Sociology
* William Edward Hartpole Lecky, historian
* John V. Luce, classicist
* F. S. L. Lyons, historian and Provost of Trinity College Dublin
* John Pentland Mahaffy, classicist
* R. B. McDowell, historian
* Robert McKim, philosopher of religion
* Christine E. Morris, Andrew A. David Professor in Greek Archaeology and History
* Jane Ohlmeyer, historian
* Franc Sadleir, Regius Professor Greek and later Provost of Trinity College Dublin; advocate for Catholic emancipation
* Brendan Simms, historian and fellow of Peterhouse, Cambridge
* William Bedell Stanford, senator and Regius Professor of Greek at Trinity College Dublin
* Alastair Sweeny, Canadian historian, publisher
* Rory Sweetman, New Zealand historian
* James Henthorn Todd, Regis Professor, co-founder of Irish Archaeological Society, president of Royal Irish Academy
* Nikolai Tolstoy, historian

## Law

* Sir James Andrews, 1st Baronet, Lord Chief Justice of Northern Ireland
* Deirdre Curtin, lawyer
* Susan Denham, former Chief Justice of the Irish Supreme Court
* Sir Valentine Fleming, chief justice of the Supreme Court of Tasmania
* Henry Flavelle Forbes, C.I.E., President of the Court of Appeal, Iraq, 1920/21
* Hari Singh Gaur, barrister, jurist and educationist in India
* John George, Solicitor-General for Ireland
* Edward Gibson, 1st Baron Ashbourne, Attorney-General and Lord Chancellor of Ireland
* Maureen Harding Clark, judge of the International Criminal Court and the High Court of Ireland
* Gerard Hogan, judge of the Court of Appeal
* Brian McCracken, retired Justice of the Irish Supreme Court; chair of the McCracken Tribunal
* Catherine McGuinness, retired Justice of the Irish Supreme Court; former member of Seanad Éireann and President of the Law Reform Commission
* Frank Murphy, United States Supreme Court Associate Justice (1940–49)
* Patricia O'Brien, United Nations Under-Secretary-General for Legal Affairs and United Nations Legal Counsel
* Christopher Palles, judge, Solicitor-General for Ireland
* Alan Shatter, politician
* James Skinner, Chief Justice of Zambia and Malawi
* William Frederick L. Stanley (1872–1939), lawyer and judge in Republic of Hawaii
* William Stawell, Chief Justice of the Supreme Court of Victoria
* Egbert Udo Udoma, justice of the Nigerian Supreme Court and Chief Justice of Uganda
* Peter Whelan, professor of law

## Literature

* Sebastian Barry, novelist
* Samuel Beckett, dramatist, Nobel laureate
* Eavan Boland, poet
* John Boyne, novelist
* Nicholas Brady, poet and translator
* Erskine Barton Childers, writer and journalist
* Eoin Colfer, children's writer
* Naoise Dolan, novelist
* William Congreve, playwright and poet
* Michael de Larrabeiti, author
* J. P. Donleavy, Irish-American author
* Richard Ellmann, literary critic and biographer
* Anne Enright, novelist, winner of Man Booker Prize 2007
* George Farquhar, dramatist
* Oliver Goldsmith, writer and surgeon
* John Haffenden, professor of literature
* Claire Hennessy, writer and editor
* Jennifer Johnston, Man Booker Prize–winning novelist
* Brendan Kennelly, poet and author
* William Larminie, poet
* Sheridan Le Fanu, author
* Michael Longley, poet
* Patrick MacDonogh, poet
* Rupert Mackeson, racing author
* Thomas MacNevin, writer and journalist
* Derek Mahon, poet
* Bryan Malessa, novelist
* Barry McCrea, novelist and lecturer
* Mark C. McGarrity, crime fiction novelist (under pen name Bartholomew Gill)
* Annemarie Ní Churreáin, poet
* Melatu-Uche Okorie, short-story writer
* Sally Rooney, novelist
* Oliver St. John Gogarty, poet and surgeon
* Jo Shapcott, poet
* Thomas Southerne, dramatist
* Bram Stoker, author, known for Dracula
* Jonathan Swift, satirist, author of Gulliver's Travels
* John Millington Synge, dramatist, poet; author of The Playboy of the Western World
* Nahum Tate, lyricist and Poet Laureate
* William Trevor, novelist particularly known for short stories
* Trevor White, food critic and author of Kitchen Con
* John Duncan Craig, poet
* Oscar Wilde, poet, dramatist, wit; read Greats in Trinity 1871–1874;

## Politics and government

* J. E. W. Addison, British judge and Conservative politician
* Ernest Alton, independent Unionist politician in the House of Commons of Southern Ireland and in Seanad Éireann
* Hugh Annesley, 5th Earl Annesley, M.P. for Cavan, later an Irish representative peer in the House of Lords
* Thekla Beere, civil servant and chairwoman of the ILO
* John Beresford, statesman
* Harman Blennerhassett, Irish-American supporter of the Burr conspiracy
* Frederick Boland, diplomat and twenty-first Chancellor of the University
* John Boyd, member of the Wisconsin State Assembly
* Noël Browne, Irish Minister for Health and physician
* Edmund Burke, philosopher, political theorist, statesman and MP for the British Whig Party
* Hugh Cairns, 1st Earl Cairns, Lord Chancellor of Great Britain and Chancellor of the University of Dublin
* Sir Edward Carson, leader of the Irish Unionists
* Hélène Conway-Mouret, French senator and former minister
* Richard Curran, National Centre Party and later Fine Gael TD
* Sir Colville Deverell, Governor of the Windward Islands and Mauritius
* Robert Emmet, Irish nationalist
* Henry Grattan, member of the Irish House of Commons
* Cecil Harmsworth, 1st Baron Harmsworth, Liberal MP and brother of press barons, Lord Northcliffe and Lord Rothermere
* Mary Harney, politician, former leader of the PDs and former Tánaiste
* Mark Herdman, diplomat, Governor of the British Virgin Islands (1986–1991)
* Douglas Hyde, first President of Ireland
* Princess Kako of Akishino, Japan
* Brian Lenihan, politician, former Minister for Finance
* George Macartney, British statesman (1st Earl Macartney)
* Jennifer Carroll MacNeill, politician
* Richard Graves MacDonnell, Governor of South Australia, Lieutenant-Governor of Nova Scotia and Governor of Hong Kong
* Josepha Madigan, politician, former Minister Minister for Culture, Heritage and the Gaeltacht
* Mairead Maguire (Irish School of Ecumenics), a peace activist, winner of the Nobel Peace Prize in 1976
* Mary McAleese, 8th President of Ireland
* Mary Lou McDonald, politician and leader of Sinn Fein*
* Leonard Greenham Star Molloy, surgeon and politician
* David Norris, senator, gay rights activist and former presidential candidate
* Conor Cruise O'Brien, politician, writer and academic
* John O'Connell, member of parliament, leader of the Repeal Association
* Liz O'Donnell, politician, former Minister for Overseas Development
* Emily O'Reilly, former journalist, author, Irish Ombudsman, European Ombudsman
* William Hoey Kearney Redmond, Nationalist politician; first World War fatality
* Mary Robinson, former President of Ireland
* Edward Stafford (politician) third Premier of New Zealand
* Sir Malcolm Stevenson, Governor of Cyprus and of the Seychelles
* James Stopford, 2nd Earl of Courtown, Tory politician
* Leo Varadkar, politician, Taoiseach and leader of Fine Gael
* Theobald Wolfe Tone, father of Irish republicanism
* Jaja Wachuku first Nigerian Foreign Affairs Minister
* Henry Westenra, 3rd Baron Rossmore, politician and piper
* Thomas Wyse, politician and diplomat

## Religion

* Arthur William Barton, Church of Ireland Archbishop of Dublin
* John Henry Bernard, Church of Ireland Archbishop of Dublin
* Robert Henry Charles, biblical scholar, theologian, and translator
* Rt. Rev. Dr. John Curtis, bishop of Chekiang, China
* John Nelson Darby, evangelist and Bible translator
* Charles D'Arcy, Church of Ireland Archbishop of Dublin and Armagh
* John Dowden, Bishop of Edinburgh and ecclesiastical historian
* Richard William Enraght, Anglican priest and religious controversialist
* William Fitzgerald, Church of Ireland bishop and author
* David F. Ford, Regius Professor of Divinity at the University of Cambridge since 1991
* Alexander Charles Garrett, bishop of the Episcopal Church in the United States of America
* John Graham, author
* William Connor Magee, Anglican Archbishop of York
* Father John Main, OSB, Benedictine monk
* Fr. Malachi Martin S.J., author
* Charles Maturin, Church of Ireland clergyman and gothic author
* Joseph Ferguson Peacocke, Church of Ireland Archbishop of Dublin
* Robert Ram, author of The Soldiers Catechism issued to the New Model Army
* William Reeves, bishop, antiquarian, and President of the Royal Irish Academy
* Robert Warren Stewart, missionary to China, murdered in Kucheng Massacre
* James Henthorn Todd, biblical scholar, educator, and Irish historian: Regius Professor of Hebrew
* William Gowan Todd, author, cleric, and founder of St. Mary's Orphanage for Boys in London
* James Ussher, Primate of All Ireland, noted for calculating the date of creation as the night preceding Sunday 23 October 4004 BC
* Robert Wyse Jackson, Bishop of Limerick, Ardfert and Aghadoe

## Sports

* Edward Allman-Smith (1886–1969), British Army soldier and field-hockey player; Olympic silver medalist, as member of the Ireland field-hockey team at the 1908 Summer Olympics
* Henry Dunlop, founder of Lansdowne Football Club and builder of Lansdowne Road stadium
* Michael Gibson, rugby footballer
* Ed Joyce Irish cricketer
* James Lindsay-Fynn, rower, world championship gold, Great Britain, LM4 - Munich 2007
* Hugo MacNeill, Ireland and British and Irish Lions rugby player
* William McCrum, inventor of penalty kick of football
* Robin Roe (1928–2010), clergyman and rugby footballer
* Dick Spring (born 1950), Gaelic footballer, hurler, rugby footballer, businessman and politician

## Other

* Sir Robert Anderson, intelligence officer, theologian and policeman
* Edward Chichester, 4th Marquess of Donegall
* Richard Lovell Edgeworth, inventor, father of Maria Edgeworth
* Mary Elmes (1908–2002), Irish aid worker who was honoured as Righteous Among the Nations for saving the lives of more than 200 Jewish children during the Second World War
* Michael Elmore-Meegan, expert on global health issues, author, humanitarian, founder of charities
* Scilla Elworthy, human rights campaigner
* Sally Fegan-Wyles, director of UNDG
* Half Hung MacNaghten, 18th-century gentleman fraudster
* Kevin McCormack, dancer with Riverdance; graduated from Trinity College with a Bachelor of Science in Pharmacy
* Leonard McNally, playwright, attorney, British spy
* Pamela Uba, medical scientist and first black person to win Miss Ireland title