Series 1 - Works

Identity area

Reference code

IE 2135 P9/1

Title

Works

Date(s)

  • 1954-1998 (Creation)

Level of description

Series

Extent and medium

4 sub-series

Context area

Name of creator

(1921-1999)

Biographical history

Jeremiah Michael O’Neill was born on 27 September 1921 in Limerick, where his father was the city’s postmaster. He was educated at the Augustinian College, Dungarvan, County Waterford. He moved to England in the 1950s where he worked in Barclays Bank (Dominion, Colonial and Overseas) and grew to specialise in colonial banking. He was posted to West Africa and ended up in Ghana and Nigeria. He returned to England with his wife Mary and his children, and became an agent in the building trade in London and the Home Counties. In 1967, he became the tenant landlord of the Duke of Wellington pub in the Ball’s Pond Road in Islington. There he established the Sugawn Theatre and Sugawn Kitchen, a well-known venue for plays and folk music.

In 1980, he left the pub trade and settled in Hornsey, where he wrote a number of plays and four novels. During this time he received two Irish Post/ AIB awards. His plays include God Is Dead on the Ball’s Pond Road, written for the Sugawn Theatre’s 1976-1977 season; Now You See Him, Now You Don’t; and Diehards. His first novels, Open Cut (1986) and Duffy Is Dead (1987), were hailed as truly original works, earning him the accolade of being ‘the laureate of the London Irish’. These first two novels were followed by Canon Bang Bang (1989) and Commissar Connell (1992). He moved to live in Kilkee, County Clare, where he completed his two last novels, Bennett & Company (1998) and Rellighan, Undertaker (1999). He died on 21 May 1999, shortly after being awarded the Kerry Ingredients Book of the Year Award for Bennett & Company.

Archival history

Immediate source of acquisition or transfer

Content and structure area

Scope and content

This series contains drafts and proofs of J. M. O’Neill’s plays and novels, other writers’ adaptations of his novel Open Cut for film and publications containing articles written by him.

Appraisal, destruction and scheduling

Accruals

System of arrangement

The documents have been divided into four sub-series by genre.

Conditions of access and use area

Conditions governing access

Conditions governing reproduction

Language of material

  • English

Script of material

    Language and script notes

    Physical characteristics and technical requirements

    Finding aids

    Allied materials area

    Existence and location of originals

    Existence and location of copies

    Related units of description

    Related descriptions

    Notes area

    Alternative identifier(s)

    Access points

    Subject access points

    Place access points

    Name access points

    Genre access points

    Description control area

    Description identifier

    Rules and/or conventions used

    Status

    Level of detail

    Language(s)

      Script(s)

        Sources

        Accession area