Sir, - Brian Maye's Irishman's Diary (August 26th) disparaged several summer schools on the basis that there was sometimes not strong enough a connection of place; or that - horribile dictu - some visitors failed to attend all the lectures; or that he did not like some of the people commemorated; or that none was a School for Arthur Griffith. It reminded me of the man who went late to his first ballet performance and after a few minutes shouted: "Speak-up - we can't hear a word down here!"
Mr Maye's reasoning would, of course, close not only all summer schools but most universities as well - lacking, as they strangely do, that geographical connection which Mr Maye values over all others.
Why a Hopkins Summer School in Monasterevin? Well, people seem to enjoy it. This year's school had representatives from 21 countries. It featured lectures; art exhibitions; four concerts; poetry readings; workshops; visits to other parts of Kildare, including a day in Maynooth University, etc., etc. Next July will mark its 14th year.
Another reason: Hopkins loved Monasterevin - "one of the props and struts of my existence" - and visited this beautiful place as often as he could. He wrote poetry there, sketched, explored the area, made friends, said his last Christmas Mass in the parish Church and came back whenever he could. To an admirer of his work, or of poetry, this is not irrelevant: remember, we are talking about a great poet and his interrelation with a place. Hopkins may not have been totally happy anywhere (unlike the rest of us) but his dying words were, "I am so happy, I am so happy." It is, we know, a mistake to read any of his poetry - or of anyone else's - as purely autobiographical: all art involves detachment.
I question Mr Maye's statement that "His poetry is inaccessible for most people"; naturally I would die for Mr Maye's right to believe this - as I hope he would for our right to hold our 14th Hopkins Conference next July. Let a thousand summer schools bloom - and continue to enliven Irish cultural life at a time when perhaps we need such energising more than ever. - Yours, etc.,
Desmond Egan, Artistic Director, The G.M. Hopkins Summer School, Monasterevin, Co Kildare.