Irish Quotes

Poetry is not Irish or any other nationality; and when writers such as Messrs. Clarke, Farren and the late F. R. Higgins pursue Irishness as a poetic end, they are merely exploiting incidental local colour.

Patrick Kavanagh
- Poetry
- End
- Colour
The Irish, as a race, have the oral tradition in their blood. A direct question to them is an anathema, but in other cases, a mere syllable of a hero's name will elicit whole chapters of stories.

P. L. Travers
- Question
- Hero
- Irish

London in the '70s was a pretty catastrophic dump, I can tell you. We had every kind of industrial trouble; we had severe energy problems; we were under constant terrorist attack from Irish terrorist groups who started a bombing campaign in English cities; politics were fantastically polarized between left and right.

Ian Mcewan
- Pretty
- Energy
- English
My great, great grandfather, Michael O'Hanson, fled the impending potato famine of Ireland and arrived in America in the early 1840s with his bride, Bridget. They headed for Philadelphia, the city of brotherly love and a mecca for Irish-Catholic immigrants then.

Hamza Yusuf
- Great
- Love
- America
My wife and I both come from Irish families. There are two kinds of Irish families: the hitting kind and the kidding kind. If you're fortunate - and both of us are - you come from the kidding kind of Irish family.

P. J. O'Rourke
- Family
- You
- Wife
A lot of Irish people perform. They perform in drawing rooms. They sing songs and they play piano.

Fiona Shaw
- People
- Drawing
- Piano
Ireland is a series of stories that have been told to us, starting with the Irish Celtic national revival. I never believed in 'Old Ireland.' It has been made all of kitsch by the diaspora, looking back and deciding what Ireland is. Yes, it is green. Yes, it is friendly. I can't think of anything else for definite.

Anne Enright
- Green
- Irish
My mother was very proud of being Irish and being a Gunnigan in a straightforward way.

John Lanchester
- Mother
- Proud
- Irish