Agnes O’Farrelly, who was born 150 years ago on July 7th, played a pioneering role in Irish women’s education, was a prominent Irish-language academic and was one of the first female Irish-language novelists.
Following graduation from the Royal University, with a BA in 1899 and an MA in 1900, she spent a term in Paris studying under the great Celtic scholar Henri D’Arbois de Jubainville, after which she was appointed a lecturer in Irish at Alexandra and Loreto colleges.Making a show of us – Frank McNally on a 1927 film that outraged Irish America
Active in the Gaelic League from an early stage, she was a member of its executive committee and director of An Cló-Chumann Ltd, which published Irish-language materials. Marie Coleman, who wrote the entry on her in the Dictionary of Irish Biography, refers to her reputed poor spoken Irish and tells the story attributed to Brian O’Nolan that on one of her visits to the Aran Islands, she terrified a little boy one Sunday morning by saying to him: “If you are going to hell, I will go with you”, having apparently confused the word “ifreann” for “Aifreann” . But the anecdote might well have been the result of professional rivalry on O’Nolan’s part.
As part of the National University Women’s Graduate Association , she campaigned to have articles deleted from the 1937 Constitution which were seen as discriminating against women.