Dublin Spanish Society

Dublin Spanish Society

Founded en 1945

Por José Antonio Sierra

  The Dublin Spanish Society was founded in 1945 when it was called the Dublin Spanish Circle. The first few meetings where held in 16 St.Stephen´s Green after which they moved to what was then the "4 provinces" in Harcourt Street. There was initially 20-30 members.

  The first President was Philip Griffin who es still very actively involved in the Society. In 1949 there was another move this time to the Shelbourne Hotel where all meetings were held and then in 1956 the Society acquired a premises in Lwr.Baggot St. The fact that for the first time the Society had their own premises they decided to give Spanish classes for which there was quite a demand and unlike today where are so many language schools, at that time these were very rare.

The classes expanded rapidly and then they started to give English classes to Spanish Students and the memberships increased until eventually it reached 600 members.

  In 1972 the Spanish Cultural Institute was opened in Dublin and Spanish classes at all levels were introduced there and as a result the membership of the Dublin Spanish Society dropped drastically and the Committee of the day debated whether to disband the Society or not.

Fortunately they decided to continue and today it is going from strengh to strengh.

  The objective of the Society when it was founded in 1945 was to foster relations between Irish and Spanish people and to promote interest in the life and culture of Spain. The activities of the Society throughout the years have been wide and varied. We have had lectures from people such a John de Courcy Ireland the well known Maritime expert who in 1985 gave a lecture on the Spanish Armada and in 1986 the famous artist Robert Ballagh gave a marvellous talk on the Spanish art. We have had a concert of dancing and music from Galicia, Asturias and the Basque country. In 1988 we had a gastronomy evening in the Bord Iascaigh Mhara premises. We have had a few plays in Spanish, lectures on El Greco, Federico Garcia Lorca, Quzes,Debates to name but a few.

  Our programma for 90/91 was as follows: In October 1990 we opened with a cheese and wine and the Peruvian group "Xacara" provided music.

In November we had an illustrated lecture on Salvador Dali. This was followed in December by our Annual Dinner in the Mount Clare Hotel.

on February 18th we had the biggest event in the history of the Society to mark Dublin´s year as European city of culture and to fulfil a long standing desire of our president Jerónimo Reyes we brought over a group of 30 flamenco dancers from Cádiz in Southern Spain who performed to a full house, almost 1300 people in the National Concert Hall. this would have been impossible to achieve without the help of Malachy McCloskey,

Don Carlos Foods who sponsored the group. The March event was a Table quiz and the well known broadcaster Donncha O´Dulaing gave a lecture in Buswells Hotel retracing his steps on the Pilgrims to Santiago de Compostela. We finished our season in May with an evening of Spanish guitar music.

  Since then we invited Marisa Robles, the harpist, to play in the R.D.S.Conferences from Juan O´Perez on modern art, John de Courcy Ireland on Argentina, and Bert Slader on his journeys through Spain. Christmas dinners in Clontarf Castle. Westbury Hotel and a super all

Spanish menu in "Da Pino" in 1994, 1995 saw the celebrations for     our 50th Anniversary take place in Mother Redcaps with a super fiesta and salsa band. All members were invited as our guests and about 160 attended a very lively party

FUENTE

Sociedad Española de Dublín, Irlanda

Dubin Spanish Society Newsletter

Editor: Annette Peard

Número 2, Programa del Año 1994/1995

Nota

La Sociedad, fundada en 1945,  cesó sus actividades después de más de cincuenta años dedicados al fomento de las relaciones culturales e históricas hispano-irlandesas, así como a la difusión de la lengua y cultura españolas en Irlanda.