People Remembered: Nuala O'Faolain

OPC member Nuala O'Faolain died of lung cancer on Friday in Dublin. Reports of her death were covered in the international press.

OPC member, Nuala O'Faolain, died of lung cancer on Friday in Dublin. Reports of her death were covered in the international press.

The IHT: Nuala O'Faolain, an Irish journalist, who mined a rich vein of longing and childhood suffering in two midlife memoirs and an acclaimed novel, "My Dream of You," died Friday night in Dublin. She was 68 and lived in Barrtra, County Clare, and Manhattan.

The cause was lung cancer, said Luke Dodd, a friend.

O'Faolain's first memoir, "Are You Somebody?" created a sensation on its publication in Ireland in 1996.
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Irish Independent: Nuala O' Faolain interview: ‘I don’t want more time. As soon as I heard I was going to die, the goodness went from life’
The writer Nuala O' Faolain is dying of cancer. In an emotion-charged interview with Marian Finucane broadcast on RTE yesterday she revealed that she was diagnosed six weeks ago in New York. She said the cancer, which began in her lungs but has now spread to her brain and liver, is incurable. She has turned down the option of chemotherapy, which could help prolong her life

Transcript of Interview by Marian Finucane with Nuala O'Faolain MF: Nuala O'Faolain you've been on the programme a number of times in connection with your writing and you wrote your memoir "Are You Somebody" in a way that it seemed it explained yourself to you and now you're doing this interview in a completely different context and I understand that it's to explain yourself to yourself as well as to us as well.
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The Belfast Telegraph: O'Faolain removal takes place in Dublin this evening
The removal of writer and broadcaster Nuala O'Faolain is due to take place in the Fairview area of Dublin this evening.

Ms O'Faolain died on Friday night at the age of 68 at the Blackrock Hospice in Dublin.

The hugely respected writer received widespread plaudits last month when she spoke on the Marian Finucane show about being diagnosed with terminal lung cancer.

Her removal takes place this evening to the Church of the Visitation in Fairview, arriving at 5.30pm.

Her funeral takes place tomorrow after 12 noon mass to Glasnevin Crematorium.
The Belfast Telegraph >>

The Washington Post: Nuala O'Faolain; Irish Writer Illuminated Female Isolation
Nuala O'Faolain, 68, an Irish journalist who in midlife turned an introduction to a collection of columns into a best-selling memoir and then quickly wrote a novel, another memoir and a biography, died of cancer May 10 at the Blackrock Hospice in Dublin.

A successful radio and television producer in England and Ireland and an opinion columnist for the Irish Times, Ms. O'Faolain in 1996 published "Are You Somebody? The Accidental Memoir of a Dublin Woman," an exploration of growing up impoverished and female in 1940s and 1950s Ireland. An instant bestseller, it was published the same year as Frank McCourt's "Angela's Ashes" and captured the despair and powerlessness of her homeland in mid-century, where, she wrote, young women are hotly pursued but "not able to defend themselves against pregnancy."
The Washington Post >>

Wikipedia: Nuala O'Faolain (1 March 1940[1] – 9 May 2008) was an Irish journalist, TV producer, book reviewer, teacher and author. She became internationally well-known for her two volumes of memoir, Are You Somebody? and Almost There, a novel, My Dream of You, and a history with commentary, The Story of Chicago May. The first three were all featured on the New York Times Best Seller list.
Wikipedia >>