Irish Language Quotes

I would love to write the story of my upbringing in Ireland.

Irish people are educated not only about artistry but local history.

I think there is a very strong sense of Irish identity, and I think partly that's to do with the fact that we have evolved differently from Britain and other countries in Europe.

Sometimes the archaism of the language when it's spoken is why we are all in love with the Irish today.

Not to Learn Irish is to miss the opportunity of understanding what life in this country has meant and could mean in a better future. It is to cut oneself off from ways of being at home. If we regard self-understanding, mutual understanding, imaginative enhancement, cultural diversity and a tolerant political atmosphereas a desirable attainments, we should remember that a knowledge of the Irish language is an essential element in their realisation.

My first language is Gaelic.

What makes Ireland inclined toward the drama is that it's a great country for conversation.

My name means freedom in Irish.

The first play I wrote was called 'Twenty-five.' It was played by our company in Dublin and London, and was adapted and translated into Irish and played in America.

Once in my childhood I had been eager to learn Irish; I thought to get leave to take lessons from an old Scripture-reader who spent a part of his time in the parish of Killinane, teaching such scholars as he could find to read their own language in the hope that they might turn to the only book then being printed in Irish, the Bible.

I can't say enough about Ireland. I can't. I'd move there.

I always gravitate towards anything from Ireland. With Irish lit, I love the use of language, but also in many instances, the Irish writers are writing about people and circumstances that I can relate to.

The Gaelic League is founded not upon hatred of England, but upon love of Ireland. Hatred is a negative passion; it is powerful - a very powerful destroyer; but it is useless for building up. Love, on the other hand, is like faith; it can move mountains, and faith, we have mountains to move.

I feel more and more the time wasted that is not spent in Ireland.

Getting involved with 'Black 47' was like getting involved with 'Dunkirk' for me. I learned a lot. But 'Black 47' was my own history from my own country.

Although the Irish language is connected with the many recollections that twine around the hearts of Irishmen, yet the superior utility of the English tongue, as the medium of all modern communication, is so great that I can witness without a sigh the gradual decline of the Irish language.

My father was totally Irish, and so I went to Ireland once. I found it to be very much like New York, for it was a beautiful country, and both the women and men were good-looking.

From day one working in TV, I have been very conscious of the way the Irish are represented, In every show I've been involved in I read the script, take out the Irishisms right away and say, 'I'll supply those'.

Our Constitution has affirmed that Gaelic is the national language. Yet there is scarcely one person in a thousand throughout Ireland who cannot speak English and scarcely one in ten who can speak Irish easily.

I spent a lot of time growing up in Ireland in Donegal.

It wasn't so long ago that it was not popular to speak Gaelic in Ireland because the areas that Gaelic is spoken in were much poorer areas.

When I was a kid, if you didn't speak Irish, you really wanted to. And you played Gaelic games and you didn't pay any attention to what was happening in the outside world, because really, Ireland was the center of the universe. And I don't think that's the case anymore. Although, admittedly, it is the center of the universe.

It seems to me you do not care what banality a man expresses so long as he expresses it in Irish.

I'm a big fan of the Irish accent. After a couple of drinks, I start to get a bit of an Irish lilt, too.