Several friends were gracious enough to read the manuscript in its various incarnations, including my wife Susan Cahill, Herman Gollob, Catherine McKenna, Jack Miles, Jacqueline Kennedy Onassis, Michael Walsh, Maureen Waters, and Robert J. White. To them all I am most grateful, for they saved me from not a few errors and misjudgments. But I hasten to add that what errors and imbalances remain are mine alone.
Looking back over the circuitous route that brought me to this study, I find I owe an enormous debt of gratitude to teachers of long ago: John D. Boyd, S.J., who first opened up to me the élan of medieval culture; Henry Traub, S J., whose felt appreciation for what it meant to be a Roman can be second to none; J. Giles Milhaven, who found it in his heart to take me into his exclusive Plato seminar despite my faulty Greek; and William V. Richardson, S.J., whose severe critiques of medieval philosophy in the light of modern experience enabled even his less brilliant students to reach some understanding of the philosophical process. After my student years, I had the good fortune to be befriended by the great Robert G. Pollock, the only real philosopher I have ever known and whose keen appreciation of Augustine gave impetus to my second chapter; and by Raymond E. Brown, S.S., to my mind the greatest living American scripture scholar and whose studies of early Christian writings and society provided much inspiration and some background for my own study. Except for the last, these teachers were associated at one time or another with Fordham University, whose library—and whose librarian, James P. McCabe—were invaluable resources. Beyond all these, there is the memory of my mother, Margaret Buckley, whose sayings, stories, and songs, passed on to her by her own mother, Brigid Delia Quinn of Williamstown, County Galway, are undoubtedly the ur-source of this book.
I am grateful, too, to many colleagues at Bantam Double-day Dell—more than I could possibly name here—who have cheered me on during my research and writing and whose enthusiasm for the result has been an unexpected gift. It is people like these, whether sales reps or editors, corporate officers or support staff, whose enthusiasm for books—even of the damnedest sort—mark them as the true successors to the Irish scribes. It is imperative that I name at least one of them, Nan Ahearn Talese. It is not often, after all, that a writer can have as his editor and publisher a combination of Medb of Cruachan, Brigid of Kildare, and the Lady of Kilcash “who shamed all women for grace.”
The author has endeavored to credit all known persons holding copyright or reproduction rights for passages quoted and for illustrations reproduced in this book, especially:
Darton, Longman & Todd, Ltd. and Doubleday, a division of Bantam Doubleday Dell Publishing Group, Inc., for the extract from The Old Life of Brigid and “Brigid’s Feast” from Celtic Fire by Robert Van de Weyer. Copyright © 1990 by Robert Van de Weyer.
Four Courts Press for the extract from Cogitosus from Saint Patrick’s World by Liam de Paor. Copyright © 1993 by Four Courts Press, Dublin.
Hamlyn Publishing Group, a division of Reed International Books, for the extract from Amhairghin’s poem from Celtic Mythology by Proinsias MacCana. Copyright © 1968, 1983 by Proinsias MacCana.
Thomas Kinsella for the extracts from The Tain: Translated from the Irish Epic Tain Bo Cuailnge by Thomas Kinsella. Copyright © 1969 by Thomas Kinsella.
Peters, Fraser & Dunlop Group, Ltd., for “The Hermit’s Song,” “Aideen,” and the extracts from “Lament for Art O’Leary” and “Kilcash” from Kings, Lords and Commons: An Anthology from the Irish by Frank O’Connor. Copyright © 1959 by Frank O’Connor.
The Irish Tourist Board for photographs of Clonfert Cathedral, Gallarus Oratory, Ogham stone, and Newgrange.
The Museum of Classical Archaeology, Cambridge, England, for photographs of the Dying Gaul.
The National Museum of Ireland for the photograph of the Ardagh Chalice.
The Board of Trinity College, Dublin, for the photograph of a page from the Book of Kells.
Weidenfeld & Nicolson Ltd. for the photograph by Jean Roubier of the Celtic sanctuary.