Some assessments
of her achievement
The following tributes to Eilís Dillon were printed shortly after her death in 1994.
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Eilís Dillon:
Some assessments of her achievement The following tributes to Eilís Dillon were printed shortly after her death in 1994. |
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Eilís Dillon Literary Estate. It is notoriously unwise to forecast which of
the hundreds of thousands of children's books of the present
day will join that very exclusive grouping which, in their
timelessness and universality, will become the classics of
future centuries. It does, however, seem certain that
Eilís Dillon's best novels will continue to be read as
long as children retain the urge to be taken out of themselves
and into strong and powerful stories.
Children's Books in Ireland
It was not just that
she kept the inkwell of Irish children's writing brimming
through pretty unproductive decades; for a long period she was
that inkwell, an inspiration to other children's writers
struggling to make an impact.
Her books will be a lasting testament to her, as will her work for writers and writing in this country."
Declan Kiberd wrote in The Irish
Times:
The death of Eilís Dillon-Mercier
has removed from the Irish scene not only a graceful and
accomplished writer, but also a powerful and influential
advocate in the cause of all artists. It would be difficult
for any friend or commentator to do justice to the versatility
of her literary output, the lucid grace of her prose, the
warmth and range of her friendships, or to the firmness of
spirit and shrewdness of purpose with which she launched
herself into many worthy projects.
She first came to
prominence as a writer of children's books in Irish and, a
little later, in English. if today there are whole sections in
our bookshops devoted to Irish children's literature, that is
due in great part to her pioneering contribution, which helped
to raise the prestige of this once-neglected area of literary
endeavour. There was, however, nothing narrowly provincial in
her writing: she simply assumed that books about children in
Irish settings, if properly written, would be of universal
interest. And so they have proved to be. [ ... ]
What
Laura Ingalls Wilder did for children's literature in the US,
she achieved in Ireland, imparting a sure historical sense in
books such as The Singing Cave. That interest in history was a
natural expression of her curiosity of mind, and of her family
inheritance. Across the Bitter Sea is her most acclaimed
historical novel for adults: it deals with the traumas of 19th
century Ireland. Its sequel, Blood Relations, treats of the
post-Rising period, whose struggles Eilís Dillon knew
well: her earliest memory was of her mother's arrest by the
Black and Tans. [ ... ]
All of her books were researched
with scholarly scruple and written with a tremendous attention
to exactitude of language. Of none was this more true than
Citizen Burke; many will concur with her late husband, the
critic Vivian Mercier, in judging it her finest achievement.
This study of an Irish priest, set against the turbulent
backdrop of the French and Irish revolutions at the end of the
18th century, is a work of imaginative reconstruction, but one
in which the pressure of felt experience is registered on
every page.
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