Donagh MacDonagh (22 November 1912 – 1 January 1968) was an Irish writer, judge, presenter, broadcaster, and playwright.
MacDonagh was born in Dublin on St Cecilia's Day in 1912. He was still a young child when his father Thomas MacDonagh, an Irish nationalist and poet, was executed in 1916.[1] His mother, Muriel Gifford, died of a supposed drowning, a year afterwards while swimming at Skerries to Shenick Island, County Dublin on 9 July 1917.[2] The two children were then taken care of by their maternal aunts, in particular Catherine Wilson.
His parents' families then engaged in a series of custody lawsuits, as the MacDonaghs were Roman Catholic and the Giffords were Protestant; in the climate of Ne Temere, the MacDonaghs were successful.
He and his sister Barbara (who later married actor Liam Redmond) lived briefly with their paternal aunt Eleanor Bingham, County Clare before being put into the custody of strangers until their late teens, when they were taken in by Jack MacDonagh. He wrote a radio play, The Happy Day, about his time with Eleanor Bingham[3]
MacDonagh was educated at Belvedere College and University College Dublin (UCD).[4] At the latter institution he earned both a Bachelor of Arts and Master of Arts degrees and was a classmate with several writers who would achieve critical success, including Cyril Cusack, Denis Devlin, Charlie Donnelly, Brian O'Nolan, Niall Sheridan and Mervyn Wall.[5] Donnelly and MacDonagh were said to have been close friends.[6]
In 1935 MacDonagh was called to the Bar and practised on the Western Circuit.[5]
In 1934 he and Niall Sheridan self published Twenty Poems with each contributing ten poems. He published three volumes of poetry: "Veterans and Other Poems" (1941), The Hungry Grass (1947) and A Warning to Conquerors (1968). He also edited the Oxford Book of Irish Verse (1958) with Lennox Robinson.
He also wrote poetic dramas and ballad operas. One play, Happy As Larry, was translated into a number of languages. He had three other plays produced: God's Gentry (1951, a ballad opera about the tinkers), Lady Spider (1959, about Deirdre of the Sorrows and the Three sons of Ussna) and Step in the Hollow a piece of situation comedy nonsense.
He also wrote short stories; staged the first Irish production of ‘’Murder in the Cathedral’’ with Liam Redmond, later his brother-in-law; and was a popular broadcaster on Radio Éireann.
He was married twice, to Maura Smyth and, following her death, to her sister, Nuala Smyth. He had four children, Iseult and Breifne by Maura, and Niall and Barbara by Nuala.
He died on 1 January 1968 and is buried at Deans Grange Cemetery.
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