John Montague who was born in New York recalls his childhood days growing up in Tyrone.
Niall Sheridan provides an introduction to the life and work of John Montague.
John Montague was born in Brooklyn in 1929. At the age of four, he and his family moved to Ireland and settled on a farm in County Tyrone. He attended St Patrick's College in Armagh and University College Dublin. Throughout the 1950s, he worked as a freelance writer and journalist. Since then he has devoted himself to writing and publishing a collection of short stories 'Death of Chieftain' (1964) and two volumes of poetry, Poisoned Lands (1961) and A Chosen Light (1967). Smaller publications include 'Forms of Exile' (1958), A Patriotic Suite (1966) and Home Again (1967). John Montague has recently completed a new volume of poems titled 'Tides' (1970).
He now lives in Paris and teaches in France and the USA where he regularly travels.
John Montague describes growing up in Ulster during the 1930s. He feels privileged to have grown up on a farm and a country post office in County Tyrone. He recalls some of the people from his young days and in particular one old woman who spoke Irish and was the inspiration for his poem 'The Sean Bhean Bhocht'.
As a child, I was frightened by her,
Busy with her bowl of tea in a farmhouse chimney corner,
Wrapped in a cocoon of rags and shawls.
'Writer in Profile' broadcast on 14 January 1970. The presenter is Niall Sheridan.
'Writer in Profile' was a weekly television interview with a well-known Irish writer. First broadcast on 29 October 1968, it ran until 1976. The programme was produced by James Plunkett.
