New York University has announced its programme to commemorate the 100 year anniversary of the Easter Rising.
The announcement was made by Glucksman Ireland House, which is the centre for Irish and Irish-American Studies at New York University.
It will focus primarily on the role of Irish-Americans and the Irish in America in the build up to, and aftermath of, the Easter Rising.
Despite being thousands of miles away, America played an important role in the Rising.
Many Irish people emigrated or were exiled to America in the years building up to the Rising. There was also strong support for Irish Independence among the Irish-American community.
One man who was exiled was Jeremiah O’Donovan Rossa. O’Donovan Rossa’s revolutionary activities during the 1860s had angered the British and he was forced to leave his homeland for America.
He arrived in New York in 1871 and spent four decades campaigning for Irish freedom. On his death his body was returned to Ireland and his funeral was attended by Easter Rising leader Pádraig Pearse.
It was at O’Donovan Rossa’s funeral that Pearse made his famous oration: “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.”
Glucksman Ireland House announced their Easter Rising programme on the centenary of the death of O’Donovan Rossa.
Miriam Nyhan of Glucksman Ireland House said: “The public programming will culminate in a major symposium in April 2016 which will gather together very world renowned and accomplished scholars who will explore what exactly went on here in places like New York and other parts of the United States which contributed to what we know of the Easter Rising today.”
There will be events every month from the September 2015 until the centenary in Spring 2016.
Schedule of planned events:
• September 17, 2015 1916: AN EVENING OF MUSIC
• October 15, 2015 JEREMIAH O’DONOVAN ROSSA: Shane Kenna with Terry Golway
• October 29, 2015 UNITED IRISH LEAGUE OF AMERICA: 17th Annual O’Malley Lecture with Francis Carroll
• November 19, 2015 1916: AN EVENING OF PROSE
• February 4, 2016 1916: AN EVENING OF POETRY
• April 20, 2016 A Terrible Beauty, screening & commentary with Colin & Dave Farrell
• April 20-22 Academic conference which includes a film screening and keynote lectures by historians Joe Lee, David Brundage, and Timothy Meagher
• April 21-22, 2016 AMERICA & EASTER 1916 Symposium
Pulitzer Prize winning Irish poet Paul Muldoon has also been commissioned to write a new poem to mark the event.
Take a look at the video below.