Smelling Shaw is the title of a talk to mark Heritage Week and George Bernard Shaw’s connection with Oughterard.
Dr Adrian Paterson, NUI Galway lecturer in English, will give the talk at the Church of Ireland Church, Oughterard, tomorrow at 8pm.
George Bernard Shaw, communicating to Johnny Holleran, a tailor and local historian in Oughterard wrote:
“Walter Bagnal Gurly of Oughterard was my maternal grandfather. He married twice and had a son Walter John and a daughter (my mother ) by his first marriage, and six daughters and one son by his second.”
Lucinda Elizabeth Gurly was born in Carlow on October 3, 1830, but spent some time in Oughterard when her parents owned and lived in Clareville House c1850. She married George Carr Shaw with whom she had three children - Lucinda Frances Shaw (1852 ), Eleanor Agnes Shaw (1854 ) and George Bernard Shaw (1856 ).
On April 16 this year, Dr Paterson participated in a round table discussion, entitled “Shaw Our Contemporary” at a Judging Shaw Day in the Butler Library, Heyman Centre for Humanities, Columbia University, New York – a discussion which preceded a lecture given by Fintan O'Toole at the same venue.
The entry fee to the talk on Friday 24 is set at €5 to cover expenses. Tickets at the door.
