Madam, – Professors Mary Daly and Brigid Laffan are proud of their achievements at UCD in the past five years (Opinion, May 6th). In first year, “English students may find themselves working in a group to devise a marketing plan for Shakespeare’s Globe Theatre”.
To those doing their Leaving Cert and wishing to study English at the university level, may I say that at NUI Galway, we still read the plays of Shakespeare. Very old hat, but some, with our help, find them quite good. – Yours, etc,
Madam, – Ronan Fanning (May 5th) invites Prof Tom Garvin to re-read Lampedusa's The Leopardciting the overly-quoted: "If we want things to stay the same as they are, things will have to change". In the novel these words are cynically uttered by Tancredi, the nephew of the protagonist Don Fabrizio. They do not reflect the views of either the protagonist or the author: change did happen and the results were worse than before.
Don Fabrizio's own words later in the novel, "We were the Leopards and Lions; those who'll take our place will be little jackals, hyenas" – are in keeping with the tenor of Prof Garvin's article. Perhaps it is Mr Fanning who should re-read The Leopard. – Yours, etc,