How did this personal letter, which is not in any archive, surface? You have described how, as an award-winning folk singer in her own right, she inspired you to develop your own musical talents.” It includes the lines: “You have spoken often over the years of the influence your mother has had on your own music and creativity. There are 660 as-yet uncatalogued boxes of Mary Robinson’s papers in the basement of NUI Galway.Īs for the correspondence sent out from the former Viceregal Lodge to citizens public and private, MacCarthy used her long-honed reporting nous to track some of these down.įor example, there is a personal letter of condolence from President Michael D Higgins to singer Shane MacGowan on the death of his mother, Therese, in 2017. Others, such as those papers belonging to Éamon de Valera, Cearbhall Ó Dálaigh and Patrick Hillery, are held at designated archives at University College Dublin. Some papers are sent to the National Archives, where the public can access them 30 years later. When an Irish president’s term of office ends, their papers technically belong to the Department of the Office of Taoiseach, as the office of the president comes under that department.
The presidential archive is sadly not in wooden trunks in some romantic attic in Áras an Uachtaráin.
In former years, when much more was communicated solely via paper, there is a correspondingly large physical archive in existence. MacCarthy pulled out some 315 pieces of correspondence which collectively represent moments in the various presidencies of historical and social significance. Like all good ideas that turn into books, it now seems remarkable that nobody else had thought of putting together a collection like this before.
It must be fierce mad annoying at these things to have people coming up to you all the time and pitching their book ideas at you.”Īnd New Island Books immediately went with her idea. As she tells it, their encounter went something like this. The book is a compendium of letters, cards and other paper ephemera both sent and received by all of Ireland’s nine presidents to date.Īs to how it found its publisher, New Island Books, MacCarthy was at an event a few years back where Edwin Higel of New Island was also in attendance. “I went looking for the book, but it wasn’t there,” says journalist Flor MacCarthy, explaining how she got the idea for The Presidents’ Letters an unexpected history of Ireland.
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