'The best banned in the land': Censorship and Irish writing since 1950

Ó Drisceoil, Donal

'The best banned in the land': Censorship and Irish writing since 1950

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Best_banned_in_the_land.pdf(446.87 KB)

Published Version

Date

2005

Authors

Ó Drisceoil, Donal

Published Version

10.1353/yes.2005.0042

Abstract

The cloud of state censorship that had cast a shadow over the Irish literary landscape since I930 eventually began to lift in the late I96os. The appeals mechanism introduced in I946 had undone some of the worst excesses of the early years of censorship (to largely symbolic effect, as most of the titles were out of print), but the first signs of liberalization did not appear until the late 1950s, when control of the Censorship Board was wrested from the Catholic Action cabal that had run it since the beginning. The improvement was limited and Irish writers continued to regard the censorship of their work as an occupational hazard; indeed, as the list of banned writers contained the majority of the greatest contemporary writers in the English language, inclusion on the register was seen by some as an inverted badge of honour. The controversies generated by the banning of works by John McGahern and Edna O'Brien in the I96os helped fuel the movement for reform, and in 1967 the censorship legislation was overhauled. This resulted in the gradual unbanning of the Irish books on the list over the next twelve years, and also marked the end of the censorship of Irish writers, with the sole exception of Lee Dunne, who carried the flag into the I970S.

Keywords

Ireland , Irish literary landscape , State censorship , Legislation , [History]

Citation

Ó Drisceoil, D. (2005) ''The best banned in the land': Censorship and Irish writing since 1950', The Yearbook of English Studies, 35(1), pp.146-160. https://doi.org/10.1353/yes.2005.0042