Talk:Flann O'Brien

message: Why remove the reference to Vico?  Geogre 13:27, 31 August 2005 (UTC)
replies: text: I didn't remove that, but I tend to agree with whomever did.  I'm not aware that the de Selby of The Third Policeman has much to do with Vico, although I'm open to correction if there are sources.  Also the bit about the bicycle recalling Beckett is rather tenuous also - Beckett's association with the bicycle is minimal compare with O'Brien's. --Ryano 14:03, 31 August 2005 (UTC)
thread_title: Removal of Vico

message: "The Dalkey Archive features a character who encounters a penitent, elderly James Joyce (who never wrote any of his books and seeks only to join the Jesuit Order) working as a busboy in the resort of Dalkey and a scientist looking to suck all of the air out of the world. "</i>
I note that an edit which changed the above to "working as a busboy in the resort of Skerries" was reverted.  I don't have a copy of the book to hand, but I believe Skerries is correct.  This Google search throws up plenty of references to Joyce working in a bar in Skerries.  The main setting of the book is Dalkey, but from my memory the narrator travels to Skerries to meet Joyce. --Ryano 12:59, 28 March 2006 (UTC)
replies: text: I was the origin of the misinformation, and I think you're right.  He's working in the Skerries, so it should be changed.  The editor was probably reverted by someone simply overturning some of the IP edits that go on, or possibly the editor added other information that was clearly false.  Geogre 14:31, 28 March 2006 (UTC)
thread_title: The Dalkey Archive - Skerries/Dalkey?

message: I'd support Geogre's remarks above regarding the merging of Myles into this article. A couple of other points: 
*Could someone in a position to do this add a complete bibliography of his works to the end of the article? 
*Could we have a date for his forced resignation from the civil servant?
*The article says that O'Nolan "(according to Anne Clune/Clissman - a tenuous and subjective claim) due to his spiralling alcoholism never regained the heights of his early work". I don't find this very clear: is Ann Clune/Clissman making this claim and a Wikipedia editor saying that it is tenuous and subjective, or is it the other way round, and whichever it is, perhaps a citation would be in order for the non Clune-Clissman bit and a clear citation for the Clune/Clissman bit? And I see that Ann Clune is cited in the bibliography, but where does Clissman come into it?
OK, that's enough nits picked for this afternoon. Palmiro | Talk 14:03, 10 May 2006 (UTC)
replies: text: FWIW, I think that "tenuous" thing came from a bit of an editorial battle.  I think one anon added it, and then another editor/anon who had read the same things (and I haven't read any of them) put in that it was tenuous.  My impression is that the allegation came from a hatchet job done on O'Nolan by one of his (numerous) detractors in Ireland.  However, we really need some expert tender loving care here, with good references and explanations.  I think that the really fiery editor who was mucking up has wandered off, and I never expected actual controversy lo those many years ago when I made a basic article on one of my favorite authors, but there is surprising heat here, and I think that's the origin of that claim and qualification.  Geogre 14:28, 10 May 2006 (UTC)
replies: text: Well, O'Nolan was a notoriously cantankerous character, so I suppose it's only fitting that the article about him should feature such shenanigans. I seem to remember reading, perhaps in your man's book (you know who I mean) an account of seeing O'Nolan stumble homewards along the side of Merrion Square, hopelessly drunk and clutching onto the area railings in front of the houses for support, all the time repeating, "Fuck the fucking fuckers. Fuck the fucking fuckers". Palmiro | Talk 14:40, 10 May 2006 (UTC)
thread_title: Merge? yes. (and other remarks)

message: I have posted this note on Talk:At Swim-Two-Birds as well, but it's worth reprinting here: I've discovered two errors in Anthony Cronin's biography.  One is that he gets wrong the title of the proto-AS2B story that O'Nolan published in Comhthrom Féinne; Cronin has it as "Scenes from a novel" but John Wyse Jackson (editor of Myles Before Myles), a man I take to have actually looked at the journal in question, gives it as "Scenes in a novel".  The other is that Cronin gives the title of O'Nolan's MA thesis as "Nature in Irish Poetry", whereas anyone with a focal or two can clearly see that Nádúirfhilíocht na Gaedhilge translates as "Nature Poetry in Irish"; this is, at any rate, how Cathal Ó Hainle (who has way more Irish than me) translates it in Clune & Hurson's collection of essays on O'Brien.  My own feeling is that these two elementary mistakes put Cronin's reliability in question, and advise (but, okay, maybe not "urge") contributors using him as a source to be on their guard. Lexo (talk) 15:51, 11 August 2008 (UTC)
replies: text: First hand accounts are often based on the subject's interests at the time, or to augment his fame, and must be read with about 20 reminiscences of other friends; then you have depth.86.42.218.22 (talk) 20:15, 7 August 2011 (UTC)
thread_title: Unreliability of Cronin biog

message: I respect the need for the guidelines on WP: Original research but sometimes I regret them.  I'm sure most Myles readers will know of the celebrated section on WAAMA in the beginning of The Best of Myles, where trained escorts take you to the theatre and ventriloquise your half of the intelligent conversation, plus all the stuff about the book-handling service, where fake letters from famous authors are left in your books?  My family inherited my grandfather's copy of The Best of Myles and stuck inside it is a genuine letter from O'Nolan to my grandpa, thanking him for an idea about WAAMA and coming up with ways to develop it.  (This is not as unlikely as it sounds, since in 30s/40s Dublin my grandpa was a well-known writer.)  Damn, I wish I knew a way to use that without it being original research. Lexo (talk) 15:58, 11 August 2008 (UTC)
replies: text: Wasn't Buchhandlung a rollover from the old Blather days? Maybe the letter was a joke on the part of your grandfather (one in keeping with the WAAMA theme). Have you tried to compare the handwriting with O'Nolan's (or, indeed, DJ's)? Rc65 (talk) 16:38, 31 December 2008 (UTC)
thread_title: Original research

message: "hence the acute pseudonym problem in attributing his work today"
What exactly is this problem? All the novels and the play are demonstrably the work of O'Nolan. A handful of Cruiskeen Lawn articles were written by Niall Montgomery but many of these have been identified (from cuttings among Montgomery's papers in the National Library of Ireland). O'Nolan also published in the provincial papers but the record of this is fairly complete, no?  —Preceding unsigned comment added by 86.46.163.225 (talk) 16:23, 31 December 2008 (UTC)
thread_title: What Pseudonym Problem?

message: I may have this wrong, but, looking at the article, there's very little information of a purely biographical nature. Most of it is taken up with the details of his writing career and style. While obviously its only right that the works take precedence and that a full account of his literary career be given, I wonder if there could be more detail about the other aspects of his life? His problems with alcohol aren't really treated, nor is his marriage. I'm afraid I'm not really enough of a Flann expert to undertake any expansion of the article myself. Thoughts? ANB (talk) 00:32, 9 February 2009 (UTC)
thread_title: Biographical Content of the Article

message: Given that Cruiskeen Lawn compilations feature in the list of works is there any reason for their omission?
88.193.200.140 (talk) 09:23, 24 November 2010 (UTC)
thread_title: Keats and Chapman's absence in the Works section

message: What is meant by a "glasses enthusiast"? A euphemism for heavy drinker, perhaps?  — Preceding unsigned comment added by 116.59.229.12 (talk) 06:27, 22 January 2013 (UTC)
thread_title:  Connor O'Nolan 

message: Is cancer catching, then? 194.72.120.131 (talk) 15:18, 8 March 2013 (UTC)
replies: text: Been taken care of, at some point. Now reads "He suffered from cancer of the throat". --Thnidu (talk) 02:02, 3 August 2015 (UTC)
thread_title:  "He caught cancer of the throat" 

message: Any chance of adding the pronunciations and audio files of the Gaelic names Brian Ó Nualláin and Myles na gCopaleen? --Thnidu (talk) 02:08, 3 August 2015 (UTC)
thread_title:  Pronunciations 

message: As I see it, the paragraph "Further reading" is about biographies of Brian O'Nolan and studies of his works. The addition of the magazines "Envoy" and "The Bell" do not belong there and should be, if at all, incorporated in the main text of the article - including references and / or examples substantiating O'Nolan's supposed "substantial contributions" to one, or the "seminal influence" the other had on his work. Albrecht Conz (talk) 06:10, 19 December 2015 (UTC)
thread_title:  Further reading / magazines 

message: The article is in places overwritten and overly familiar. Quite unprofessional. 86.159.237.148 (talk) 01:19, 5 January 2024 (UTC)
thread_title:  Overwritten