GAA journalism

Started by qwerty123, July 02, 2012, 12:46:42 PM

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heffo

A fella I know used to ghost-write a column for a well known experienced GAA figure who was getting a serious wedge for his 'column'.

Every week would be the same, he'd call him on the Wednesday before a game say between Mayo & Donegal:

Journo: Well Mister X how do you see Sundays game going:
Pundit: I like those two blondie lads
Journo: McDonald is gone from the panel a while now and Mortimer is out for the last few months with a knee problem
Journo: Any thoughts on Donegal?
Pundit: Haven't seen much of them to be honest and wouldn't know too many of their players
Journo: Mayo to win comfortably so? thanks for taking the call

IolarCoisCuain

Quote from: heffo on July 20, 2012, 09:29:30 AM
A fella I know used to ghost-write a column for a well known experienced GAA figure who was getting a serious wedge for his 'column'.

Every week would be the same, he'd call him on the Wednesday before a game say between Mayo & Donegal:

Journo: Well Mister X how do you see Sundays game going:
Pundit: I like those two blondie lads
Journo: McDonald is gone from the panel a while now and Mortimer is out for the last few months with a knee problem
Journo: Any thoughts on Donegal?
Pundit: Haven't seen much of them to be honest and wouldn't know too many of their players
Journo: Mayo to win comfortably so? thanks for taking the call

Heffo, I doubt a truer word was ever posted here. Fair play to you.

rrhf

It was Kingsley Black.

Lar Naparka

Quote from: squire_in_navy_slacks on July 18, 2012, 10:08:52 AM
http://www.seangarvan.ie/brolly.pdf

go on the joe

I'm with you on that one, squire.
Onto  f**k on a one way ticket.
I take exception to one of the allegations he made about Conor Mortimer.

"Dublin club Parnell's recruited him from his Mayo club last year having, coincidentally, hired him
as their in-house gymnasium supervisor.
They are already beginning to count the cost, as their championship ambitions are again in the process of turning to ashes."

Now, I don't need Joe Brolly's  help if I want to think of valid reasons to call Conoreen a bollix. I got plenty of them to hand but I'd not go so far as to say he's the cause of Parnell's misfortunes.
Nil Carborundum Illegitemi

rrhf

You just wouldnt want to get on the end of Brollys tongue.  He writes brilliantly but when hes on the form he takes everyone out.  You could see more teams boycotting interviews over stuff like this.   

NaomhBridAbú

Quote from: rrhf on July 20, 2012, 12:30:04 PM
You just wouldnt want to get on the end of Brollys tongue.  He writes brilliantly but when hes on the form he takes everyone out.  You could see more teams boycotting interviews over stuff like this.

Brolly is a jerk
in the land of the blind, the one-eyed man is king. but he still only has one eye

qwerty123

Yesterday saw the passing of a great man who happened to write a bit too, Con Houlihan. Ar dheis lámh Dé go raibh sé.

Syferus

#97
Firstly, rest in peace to the man - he clearly touched alot of sports fans' hearts - but I have to admit I never connected with Con Houlihan's writing. His writing, and that of Billy Keane's (whose style is obviously very much reminiscent of, and deeply influenced by, Houlihan's) have always appeared to me, if I'm being completely honest, as poorly written.

Maybe he was better decades ago but when I learnt his general writing format was him writing a single sentence on one page of paper and then compiled by others it explained the jumpiness I saw in his writing, nothing ever seemed to flow together and it had a sort of drunken stream-of-consciousness quality to it, and by that I mean that it felt slower than it should, inelegant.

I know his ability to veer from GAA to boxing to soccer and back again in a few lines is held up as something special but it always gave me a sense of whiplash from the abruptness of it all.

And then so much of what he said seemed to be banal and obvious, actual insight or against-the-grain thinking looked to be almost entirely absent from his writing. He'd make quirky little old-timey similes but the felt somewhat at sea in articles about modern sport. It never struck me as witty. They seemed at times like an Ireland's Own article tucked away in a national newspaper.

I'm not dancing on a dead man's grave and I'd genuinely love to hear more opinions of fans of his work on what about his actual writing style drew them to him.

cadence

lolz at the heffo post.

IolarCoisCuain

Quote from: Syferus on August 10, 2012, 03:31:55 AM
Firstly, rest in peace to the man - he clearly touched alot of sports fans' hearts - but I have to admit I never connected with Con Houlihan's writing. His writing, and that of Billy Keane's (whose style is obviously very much reminiscent of, and deeply influenced by, Houlihan's) have always appeared to me, if I'm being completely honest, as poorly written.

Maybe he was better decades ago but when I learnt his general writing format was him writing a single sentence on one page of paper and then compiled by others it explained the jumpiness I saw in his writing, nothing ever seemed to flow together and it had a sort of drunken stream-of-consciousness quality to it, and by that I mean that it felt slower than it should, inelegant.

I know his ability to veer from GAA to boxing to soccer and back again in a few lines is held up as something special but it always gave me a sense of whiplash from the abruptness of it all.

And then so much of what he said seemed to be banal and obvious, actual insight or against-the-grain thinking looked to be almost entirely absent from his writing. He'd make quirky little old-timey similes but the felt somewhat at sea in articles about modern sport. It never struck me as witty. They seemed at times like an Ireland's Own article tucked away in a national newspaper.

I'm not dancing on a dead man's grave and I'd genuinely love to hear more opinions of fans of his work on what about his actual writing style drew them to him.

I think you put your finger on it there Syferus, unbeknownst to you. Reading the Sunday World or Herald stuff would be a bit like seeing Michael Jordan's final year with the Washington Wizards and wondering what all the fuss was about. Everybody is of their time.

Hardy

Con Houlihan - Billy Keane.

James Joyce - John B. Keane.

sheamy

what do the dashes mean in this case?

Hardy

Somebody compared Con with Billy.

mlcollins

So because his pieces were not alined or conformed to a tangable format and because there was an element of tangengiality or ostentaciousness your questioning his writings,forgive me but i thought these were exactly the virtues in the literary world that set aside the geniuses from the everyday hack.

Syferus

#104
Quote from: mlcollins on August 10, 2012, 07:21:27 PM
So because his pieces were not alined or conformed to a tangable format and because there was an element of tangengiality or ostentaciousness your questioning his writings,forgive me but i thought these were exactly the virtues in the literary world that set aside the geniuses from the everyday hack.

The same could be said for this, though: http://www.sundayworld.com/columnists/index.php (It's the article that begins half way down that page, and it'll only be available at that link until Sunday as they appear not to archive those types of articles)

Incidentally, he may have created the most verbose and pompous eulogy this side of Mark Antony.

I think the very best journalism comes from people who sense of self is secondary to the story or topic (something I'm not saying Houlian suffered from, an example of the above would be Tom Humpheries or Toy Curtis) and has a keen thoroughfare. I really don't think much of Houlian's writing had the latter. Excellent journalism doesn't really need to be eccentric, which is what Houlian's journalism clearly was.

I'll have to look more more of his older articles to comment on what it was in the 70's or 80's but that's certainly what the later writing suffered from.