Ollam: Studies in Gaelic and Related Traditions in Honor of Tomás Ó Cathasaigh (The Fairleigh Dickinson University Press Celtic Publications Series)

Review\nIt is always a challenge to produce a cohesive and thematically focused Festschrift for a retiring scholar, and when the scholar in question is as influential and well-loved as the honorand of this volume, Harvard Professor Emeritus Tomás Ó Cathasaigh, the hill one has to climb is particularly steep. Happily, editor Matthieu Boyd has risen to the occasion, bringing to this collection of essays the same level of discernment and editorial eagle eye that characterized his earlier compilation of Ó Cathasaigh's essays, Coire Sois, The Cauldron of Knowledge: A Companion to Early Irish Saga.... [T]his is an extremely valuable collection and a fitting tribute to the scholar it seeks to honor...[I]t is in many ways much like Tomás Ó Cathasaigh himself: rigorous, thoughtful, wide-ranging, and full of fascinating tidbits of information. ― The Medieval Review\nIn Celtic Studies—short on literary monographs in comparison with related fields—the Festschrift has often been the vehicle for major, seminal research articles. In this valuable volume, offered in honour of Professor Tomas O Cathasaigh of Harvard, there are twenty-one pieces. . . . Ollam is attractively and clearly printed, with few typographic errors. Each chapter has its own bibliography, but a list of other works cited is also present, and a helpful index. The title of the book is the Old Irish word for the highest grade of poet, or indeed of any learned profession; it means ‘most supreme’, and is also the modern Irish word for ‘professor’. O Cathasaigh is an ollam indeed, and this stimulating collection is a fitting marker of the respect in which he and his work are held. ― Folklore\nOllam (“ollav”), named for the ancient title of Ireland’s chief poets, celebrates the career of Tomás Ó Cathasaigh, Henry L. Shattuck Professor of Irish Studies at Harvard University, who is one of the foremost interpreters of the rich and fascinating world of early Irish saga literature. It is a complement to his own book of essays, Coire Sois, the Cauldron of Knowledge: A Companion to Early Irish Saga, also edited by Matthieu Boyd (University of Notre Dame Press, 2014), and a sequel to his classic monograph The Heroic Biography of Cormac mac Airt (Dublin Institute for Advanced Studies, 1977) and as such it begins to show the richness of his legacy.\nThe essays in Ollam represent cutting-edge research in Celtic philology and historical and literary studies. They form three clusters: heroic legend; law and language; and poetry and poetics. The 21 contributors are among the best Celtic Studies scholars of their respective generations, whether they are rising stars or great professors at the finest universities around the world. The book has a Foreword by William Gillies, Emeritus Professor at the University of Edinburgh and former President of the International Congress of Celtic Studies, who also contributed an essay on courtly love-poetry in the Book of the Dean of Lismore. Other highlight include a new edition and translation of the famous poem Messe ocus Pangur bán; a suite of articarticles on the ideal king of Irish tradition, Cormac mac Airt; and studies on well-known heroes like Cú Chulainn and Finn mac Cumaill.\nThis book will be a must-have, and a treat, for Celtic specialists. To nonspecialists it offers a glimpse at the vast creative energy of Gaelic literature through the ages and of Celtic Studies in the twenty-first century.