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an Congar -1930s method?

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  • 12-10-2014 7:08am
    #1
    nbrome
    Registered Users Posts: 69 ✭✭


    I just read a really funny piece by Flann O'Brien on An Congar, which was apparently a method introduced in the 1930s to facilitate learning Irish, so the editor of the book says. (there is a fada on the 'o' which for some reason my pc won't do today).
    I've searched online for info on this method but haven't come up with anything. Does anyone know anything about it?


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    #2
    AnLonDubh
    Registered Users Posts: 216 ✭✭AnLonDubh


    nbrome wrote: »
    I just read a really funny piece by Flann O'Brien on An Congar, which was apparently a method introduced in the 1930s to facilitate learning Irish, so the editor of the book says. (there is a fada on the 'o' which for some reason my pc won't do today).
    I've searched online for info on this method but haven't come up with anything. Does anyone know anything about it?
    If I'm guessing correctly, it would be Shán Ó Cuív's "An comhgar chun na Gaedhilge d'fhoghluim". An excellent book. It contains several grammatical points that you wouldn't find in modern grammars of Irish and was a fantastic course. (To be honest almost all modern Irish grammars don't measure up to the ones from the 1900s -1930s).

    I read it myself. At some point I'm going to scan it (it's out of copyright), so I'll post here when I do.


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    #3
    nbrome
    Registered Users Posts: 69 ✭✭nbrome


    Thanks for that info. If anyone is interested, the section is included in 'Myles before Myles', a selection and introduction by John Wyse Jackson.
    With the correct spelling provided by AnLonDubh, I've been able to search on the net and came across a discussion of one of the grammar points on another forum. Enough to give me an idea of what's in the book.
    Now I myself am a grammar nerd, but I still find the O'Brien take-off very funny. Here's a bit:
    "PROPOSITION II: To determine, by means of AN CONGAR and log-tan. tables only, the age at which a man can be properly termed a "fear mor", from the Gaelic phrase 'Ta'n fear mor'. (apologies again for lack of fadas). There follow various attempts at drawing triangles and producing algebraic equations, resulting in the "CONCLUSION: The minimum age at which a man can be properly described as "fear mor" is 46 years."
    Well, I suppose you have to read it to find it funny. Something light for a Sunday afternoon!


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    #4
    AnLonDubh
    Registered Users Posts: 216 ✭✭AnLonDubh


    I meant to answer this earlier.

    If you ever read a late 19th/early 20th century grammar of Irish like Ó Nuallain's (Myles' uncle, in my mind the man with the strongest academic grasp of Irish grammar ever) or Ó Cuív's books you will understand the joke.

    Here is Ó Nualláin's explanation of the nominative absolute:
    https://archive.org/stream/NewEraGrammarOfModernIrish/NewEraGrammar#page/n117/mode/2up

    Here is a page from his simplified classification of the copula (a fuller description is in his Studies in Modern Irish):
    https://archive.org/stream/NewEraGrammarOfModernIrish/NewEraGrammar#page/n165/mode/2up


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    #5
    nbrome
    Registered Users Posts: 69 ✭✭nbrome


    Well, glad that was the simplified version! Thanks for posting that, I've saved it for more study.


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