Na Coisithe/The Walkers

(Johnny Gogan, 2009, 52mins)


LINK TO FULL FILM https://vimeo.com/403816913

“I had at least heard of Séamus Ennis, unlike Liam S. Gogan, the subject of a recent TG4 documentary, Na Coisithe. Gogan was another man of style and substance, who invented the Irish word for Republic – poblacht – and whose poem Na Coisithe is apparently well known to people who know such things. But his contribution to Dinneen’s dictionary was officially ignored. This documentary by his grandson Johnny Gogan introduced us to a most engaging figure, and yet the mere fact that it took one of his own descendants to recognise this contribution tells us much more about our inability to distinguish between good and bad.”
— Declan Lynch, Sunday Independent, April 2010

Gogan’s grandfather Liam S. Gogan was the first Irish poet of the independence generation to translate the work of Europe’s leading poets into Irish. He has recently been recognised by the likes of Louis de Paor as the most important Irish poet of the inter-war years. He was also friendly with Germany’s war-time ambassador to Ireland, Edouard Hempel. Johnny Gogan retraces his creative and controversial political journey which included transplanting his own family to Germany in that significant year of 1936 where, among other events, they witnessed Hitler’s unopposed reoccupation of the Rhineland.

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