Letters: Memories of former Trinity College students

Shane Ross (Rugby School and TCD) has just written an interesting book on Mary Lou McDonald entitled A Republican Riddle (London: Atlantic Books, 2022).

Part of the book was serialised in the News Letter on November 21.

We learn gratifyingly that she received 'a privileged education' at Trinity College Dublin, Ireland's greatest university, in the Department(s) of English in 1988-1993.

She coincided in Trinity in the Departments of English I (and II) with Shane Paul O'Doherty.

I can say without reservation that Shane (a great man in my opinion) was the most brilliant student we ever admitted from Wormwood Scrubs.

He had been encouraged to come to us by my colleague Terry Brown and found his way into my seminar on Sir Gawain and the Green Knight.

Believe you me, he made his mark in those seminars with a series of pertinent comments on the British Empire, and the more he discomfited me, an English blow-in from the Forest of Dean, the more my students loved him.

But like the brilliant David Norris, I have no memory of Mary Lou McDonald in her time at Trinity and no idea whether she ever attended a lecture by me or not.

Perhaps just as well if not in 1988-1990.

But she has certainly made a great impression on us all since then.

I met her a few times in Mount Jerome in Rathgar when she was supporting Derek Linster and the Bethany Home (Protestant) orphans there.

She was a tremendous force for good there and I know that Derek was deeply indebted to her.

I also met her in St Patrick's Cathedral for at least one Remembrance Day service and she was greeted on all sides with warmth for her presence there.

I can truthfully say that there was never a dull moment in the Department(s) and School of English in all my time at Trinity (1968-2012).

I can only hope in 2022 that Mary Lou and Shane will look back fondly on their time with us.

Dr Gerald Morgan, Fellow, Trinity College Dublin