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UMI University Microfilms International A Bell & Howell Information Company 300 North Zeeb Road, Ann Arbor, Ml 48106-1346 USA 313/761-4700 800/521-0600 Order Number 8922651 Patrick Pearse and the politics of redemption: The mind of the Easter Rising, 1916 Moran, Seân Farrell, Ph.D. The American University, 1989 Copyright ©1989 by Moran, Seàn Farrell. All rights reserved. UMI 300 N. Zeeb Rd. Ann Arbor, MI 48106 PATRICK PEARSE AND THE POLITICS OF REDEMPTION: THE MIND OF THE EASTER RISING, 1916 by Se^n Farrell Moran submitted to the Faculty of the College of Arts and Science of The American University in Partial Fulfillment of the Requirements for the Degree of Doctor of Philosophy in History Signaturesss of Committee: Chair: Dean of the College 2 Mav 1989 Date 1989 The American University Washington, D.C. 20016 THE AMERICAN UNIVERSITY LIBRARY (g' COPYRIGHT by SEAN FARRELL MORAN 1989 ALL RIGHTS RESERVED PATRICK PEARSE AND THE POLITICS OF REDEMPTION: THE MIND OF THE EASTER RISING, 1916 BY Sean Farrell Moran ABSTRACT Previous historical analysis of Patrick Pearse and his participation in Dublin's Easter Rising of 1916 has failed to explain how it was that Pearse came to have such an unlikely role. This dissertation considers Pearse's life psychoanalytically within the context of contemporary Irish nationalism to explain how he became the spokesman for the most violent forces within the nationalist movement. An examination of Pearse's psychological development, his speeches, poetry, and political writings and his careers as an important Irish journalist, educator, and artist, reveals that he was unprepared for adulthood. He sought to resolve this crisis in some type of resolute act that would redeem himself as a person. In the search for psychological resolution Pearse spoke to his culture and time. His personal quest coincided with the failure of the Gaelic Revival, constitutional politics, and the Irish Republican tradition to bring forth Ireland's independence from Great Britain and her culture. Failure to realize independence ii led many Irish nationalists to embrace a theology of violence through which self-immolation, violence, and defeat could be justified. It was Pearse's identification and articulation of that theology in mythic terms which mobilized republicans into a doomed insurrection that promised eternal victory over the enemy. Pearse's achievement has had a lasting impact on the course of subsequent Irish politics. Pearse has been enshrined as an Irish patriot and his theological legacy has continued to provide both motivation and justification to generations of members of the Irish Republican Army. His contribution to that history should not, however, eclipse the fact that Pearse brought to Irish politics concerns which were not limited to Ireland. Patrick Pearse was not a parochial enigma: like many of his generation., he was deeply concerned that the modern age's culture of reason as represented by Britain was a threat to Irish values and culture. By embracing the subjectivity of myth over the dictates of reason and pragmatism, Pearse came to articulate the Irish rejection of modernity at a critical moment in European history. Ill ACKNOWLEDGEMENTS I am deeply grateful to a number of scholars and teachers who have assisted me in the writing of this dissertation. It would be difficult to credit adequately the help and wise counsel accorded to me by my mentor and friend, Terence Murphy. Likewise, I extend thanks to Coilin Owens, A1 Mott, Janet Oppenheim, and Valerie French who helped formed the committees which oversaw this work at both the thesis and dissertation levels. Graham J. Barker- Benfield helped me with the psychoanalytical methodology and David Rodier made sure my theology was correct. Martha Rybka Murphy staggered through the text on the computer with amiable good spirits. Several people have taken time to read or respond to chapters of this work over the past couple of years including Maurice O'Connell, Ruth Dudley Edwards, Alan O'Day, Roger Brown, Ted Rosche, and Pat Cooke. I would like to express my gratitude to The American University Office of Graduate Affairs, and my colleagues in the History and Political Science Department of Montgomery College, for their encouragement. I thank my family in Ireland, Patrick and Nancy Farrell of Bailieborough and Captain James Kelly and his wife Sheila for their insights on contemporary events in Ireland. I must also recognize my iv debts to my former colleagues on the staffs of Chestnut Lodge Hospital and the Mental Health Care Unit of Georgetown University Hospital. As I complete this work I cannot help but remember my parents Peter and Marilayne Moran who gave me my love for history, Edward A. MacDowell who gave me a love of ideas, and JoAnne Munger who convinced me that I should pursue a scholar's life. Lastly, I dedicate this to my long suffering wife, occasional typist, and fellow redhead Julie Gilroy Moran who has helped and encouraged me through good times and bad ones alike. TABLE OF CONTENTS ABSTRACT .................................................... ii ACKNOWLEDGEMENTS ......................................... iv Chapter I. THE INDIVIDUAL AND THE HISTORICAL EVENT .... 1 II. THE MAKING OF A NATIONAL H E R O .................... 31 III. THE STATE OF IRELAND ............................... 72 The Cultural Movement ............. ..... 72 The Political Movement ........................ 82 The Resurrection of the Military Movement ........................ 94 Tom Clarke and the Irish Republican Brotherhood ............. 94 The Home Rule Crisis of 1 9 1 2 - 1 9 1 4 ......................... 100 IV. IRELAND AND THE POLITICS OF REDEMPTION .................................... 112 V. PEARSE 1900-1912: THE MAKING OF A NATIONAL H E R O ............................... 144 Journalist and Educator ..................... 144 Political Novice .............................. 163 VI. THE RISING ........................................ 175 The Radical Rhetorician ..................... 175 Pearse's Vision of Violence and Death ..................................185 Easter Monday, 1 9 1 6 ........................... 215 VII. PATRICK PEARSE AND THE EUROPEAN REVOLT AGAINST REASON .......................... 227 VI VIII. PATRICK PEARSE AND PATRIOTIC SOTERIOLOGY: THE IRISH REPUBLICAN ARMY AND THE SANCTIFICATION OF POLITICAL SELF-IMMOLATION ................................ 265 APPENDIX ...................................................304 BIBLIOGRAPHY ............................................. 317 Vll CHAPTER I THE INDIVIDUAL AND THE HISTORICAL EVENT Patrick Pearse was one of the people least likely to become one of Ireland's greatest national heroes. Since his execution at the hands of a British firing squad in 1916, he has generally been mishandled by historians, most of whom wished to see him raised to sainthood or cast off as strange and frivolous. Despite scholarship of considerable insight, Pearse's personality has remained elusive and difficult to understand. Because he has proven to be so enigmatic, the question of how Patrick Pearse came to be a violent revolutionary and to play a critical role in Dublin's Easter Rising of 1916 has yet to be answered. It is the argument of this dissertation that Patrick Pearse was exactly the right man at exactly the right moment in his country's history. Because of his background and the course of his personal development, Pearse was ready and able to address the major political issue of his time. This does not mean that Pearse was saintly, original, or profound; rather, his personal life and a great historical event were wholly intertwined. He has become a national hero because his personal life and Irish political life met 2 at a point where each was going through a profound crisis; the solution which Pearse sought and found for his personal life was to be the same solution that proved to be a critical event which changed Irish history— the Easter Rising of 1916. This coincidence has led to Pearse's