Máire Mhac an tSaoi

Máire Mhac an tSaoi, born Máire MacEntee in Dublin in 1922, emerged as a revolutionary Modernist poet writing in the Corca Dhuibhne dialect of Munster Irish. She joined Seán Ó Ríordáin and Máirtín Ó Direáin in a trinity that transformed Irish language poetry during the 1940s and 1950s. Her work bridged medieval bardic traditions and contemporary life, creating verses that felt both ancient and urgently present. She lived to ninety-nine, dying in 2021 after a lifetime of shaping modern Irish literature.