Samuel Beckett, Horslips and the Gospel of St John all featured at a public commemoration for Jennifer Johnston on Saturday afternoon in a programme arranged by the writer herself before her death this week, aged 95.
Her son the journalist Patrick Smyth told those gathered in the Public Theatre of Trinity College that his mother had not wanted a “church funeral” but she did want a “ceremony”. Her instructions had included the hymns to be sung at a private cremation earlier on Saturday and orders to those present to “sing”. It was “very Church of Ireland”, Smyth joked.
The Trinity commemoration began with a Horslips song, Time to Kill, which opens with the words: “I see the last black swan/Fly past the sun/I wish I too were gone/Back home again.”
Then Johnston’s long-time friend, TV producer Lelia Doolan, read St John’s Gospel: “In the beginning was the word…” It was a text, she said, “perfect for a writer”. Recalling their many outings together, Doolin also paid personal tribute to the deceased, the “best, friendliest, and most mischievous companion”.
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Johnston’s daughter Lucy Daniels read, “by order of the Ma”, an extract from Beckett’s Waiting for Godot:
“Let us not waste time in idle discourse. Let us rather do something, while we have the chance. It is not every day that we are needed. Not indeed that we personally are needed. Others would meet the case equally well, if not better. To all mankind they were addressed, those cries for help still ringing in our ears. But, at this place, at this moment of time, all mankind is us, whether we like it or not. Let us make the most of it, before it is too late.
Roddy Doyle called Johnston “Ireland’s greatest writer” and described how reading her novel The Invisible Worm had helped him to create Paddy Clarke Ha Ha Ha, the work for which he won the Booker Prize in 1993.
Dermot Bolger looked back on a 28-year friendship with a woman he had teasingly called “Prudence”, a middle name of which she was embarrassed. He called her by it again in his eulogy but concluded: “Thank you, Jennifer. Every writer knew that in the benediction of your friendship, we were truly blessed.”
Rosaleen Linehan read an extract from Johnston’s theatrical monologue Christine; another son of the writer, Malachy Smyth, read from Chekhov’s the Seagull; a daughter Sarah Smyth read St Francis’s Prayer.
The music also included Jerome Kern’s The Way You Look Tonight, sung by Ella Fitzgerald, and Gluck’s J’ai Perdu Mon Eurydice, by Maria Callas.
Capt Pol O’Donnell, aide-de-camp, represented President Higgins at the commemoration. Those attending also included Labour Party leader Ivana Bacik, former president of the Court of Appeal George Birmingham, playwright Frank McGuinness, former director of the Abbey Theatre Fiach Mac Conghail, writer Evelyn Conlon, and actors Pauline McLynn and Nick Dunning.
Among representatives of the media were Irish Times editor Ruadhán Mac Cormaic; deputy editor Conor Goodman; assistant general secretary of the National Union of Journalists Seamus Dooley; Cliff Taylor; Conor O’Clery; Patsy McGarry; Hugh Linehan; Paul Gillespie; Deirdre McQuillan; Joe Carroll; Deaglán de Bréadún; Angela Long; Marie O’Halloran; Gerard Cavanagh, and Michael Foley.
