Through his editorship of An Claidheamh Solais he gave much space to Gaelic literature. He had a great appreciation of European literature and felt that Irish literature had a lot to learn from it. He loved Henrik Ibsen. He had an appreciation of the brilliant Anglo-Irish writers of the time, for example he said of W.B. Yeatsthat he had never ceased to work for Ireland. He saw that there was little good literature in Irish so he wrote it himself. At first he wrote under a pseudonym - Colm O'Conaire e.g. the short story "The Piper's Cave" - a Mark Twain type adventure. Other children's stories followed which were very popular. He related and interpreted the heroic tales of ancient Ireland in the magazine.
He had a vivid and dark imagination e.g. the story of Brigid of the Songs which was the tale of a fabulous elderly singer who was not picked locally to go to the main Oireachtas Feis in Dublin. She decides to walk there herself and, exhausted, dies singing her encore song at the Feis. Tragedy was a keynote of many of his plays, poems and short stories. He loved the story of Cuchulainn, the mythological young warrior from the North. In fact, the motto for St. Endas was from Cuchulainn's famous speech "I care not though I were to live but one day and one night, provided my fame and deeds live after me".
He felt Ireland was in darkness and that a second glorious age was to come. An early poem of his "I hail thee, O Land of our heritage" (which was later set to music) is a tribute to the beauty, literary and heroic traditions of Ireland and promises her eternal love.
He defined the greatness of poetry as "the clear sheer detection and statement of some naked truth, the touching of some deep bedrock foundation, the swift, sure stroke at the very heart of a thing".
In some of his poetry he certainly achieved this. Always single-minded and sincere, this gave his writings a moral force. In his poem "I am Ireland", he spoke of old and lonely Ireland as if an old woman, shamed by the lack of freedom of her children. He was gradually to move to a point in 1916 where he felt that a blood sacrifice (his own death) would free Ireland and bring about a new age. A dreamer, he believed in the dreams becoming reality. In "The Fool" he states: "O wise men, riddle me this: what if the dream comes true? What if the dream comes true? And if millions unborn shall dwell in the house that I shaped in my heart, the noble house of my thought?" He went on to say in that poem: "Do not remember my failures - but remember this, my faith".
In "The Rebel" he warns "And I said to my people's masters: Beware, Beware of the thing that is coming, beware of the risen people". In July 1914, he had a collection of 12 poems published and he was to go on writing poetry until he died. He was always committed to bi-lingualism and wrote in Irish and English himself. Often he had no choice but to speak English to get a message across.
Pádraig Pearse advocated a National theatre which would be the exponent of the country's soul. He said: "We should have our own plays, historical ones, comedies, tragedies, Irish, Anglo-Irish - plays that appeal to all kinds and degrees of Irish Irelanders". He wanted to see a troup of Irish-speaking players to be sent throughout the Gaeltacht. One could say that that dream has certainly become a reality in the National Folk Theatre which is so near this peaceful Memorial Park.
In his school, acting and stage performances were an important part of education as well as fund-raising for the school. He wrote a number of plays himself including, ironically enough, a hugely successful passion play.
In his public speaking, he was, in his prime, apparently brilliant. He pursued the Gospel of Nationality as a poet, philosopher and mystic. It was said that people hung on his melodious words, dreamed his dream and, very largely, did his will. The pinnacle of his public speaking career was his oration at O'Donovan Rossa's funeral in 1915. He said: "They think they have pacified Ireland. They think they have pacified half of us and intimidated the other half. They think they have foreseen everything, they think that they have provided against everything but the fools, the fools, the fools - they have left us our Fenian dead and, while Ireland holds these graves, Ireland unfree shall never be at peace".
An observer at that funeral said that he spoke with the soul of a patriot, breathing words of love and devotion, hope, truth and courage. From 1915 on, he wore black in mourning for his eventual death. He was aware the rising might fail, but was also aware of how powerful his martyrdom could be in the context of Irish history.
One of the poems which he wrote before his death is very apt for this particular Garden - "The Wayfarer":
The beauty of the world hath made me sad,
This beauty that will pass;
Sometimes my heart hath shaken with great joy
To see a leaping squirrel in a tree,
Or a red lady-bird upon a stalk,
Or little rabbits in a field at evening,
Lit by a slanting sun,
Or some green hill where shadows drifted by
Some quiet hill where mountailly man hath sown
And soon would reap; near to the gate of Heaven;
Or children with bare feet upon the sands
Of some ebbed sea, or playing on the streets
Of little towns in Connacht,
Things young and happy.
And then my heart hath told me:
These will pass,
Will pass and change, will die and be no more,
Things bright and green, things young and happy;
And I have gone upon my way
Sorrowful.
After his execution, the President of the Court Martial which had condemned Pearse to death said: "I have just done one of the hardest tasks I have ever had to do. I have had to condemn to death one of the finest characters I have ever come across. There must be something very wrong in the state of things that makes a man like that a rebel. I don't wonder that his pupils adored him".
Pádraig Pearse wanted to be a martyr - he wanted to make an impact on Irish history and he did not want to grow old. The legacy of this special individual lives on through his actions, words and in this special oasis created by Tralee U.D.C. to his memory".
