Conor Kostick meets Thomas Kinsella

Conor writes:

One of my favourite books is The Táin, Thomas Kinsella's version of the Irish epic Táin Bó Cúailnge, with illustrations by Louis le Brocquy (Dolmen, 1969; Oxford University Press, 1970). So it was with great pleasure that I learned that Thomas Kinsella was visiting Farmleigh Library, which is where I am working at the moment: unravelling the mysteries of the Gerald of Wales manuscript I came across last year. Neither of us are particularly gregarious upon meeting someone for the first time, so I have no lively anecdotes from the day, other than this. Ed Mulhall (of RTE news) was showing Thomas Kinsella an ipad and by way of illustration of its use, called up an app to do with James Joyce's Finnegans Wake. Kinsella leaned over and began to read the page aloud. We were in the cafe at the time and in our corner of the room a hush developed as we leaned in to hear him. He has a great reading voice and what's more, it all made sense. It makes me think that someone - now that the Joyce copyright has nearly expired - should produce an audio book of Kinsella reading Finnegans Wake and I'm sure all of us who have struggled to get through it would then appreciate it so much more.