POET AND DRAMATIST

Star (Christchurch), Issue 20055, 18 September 1920, Page 8

POET AND DRAMATIST

ALDERMAN M'SWINEY'S CAREER. iU ™W)ON, September 3. Alderman M'Swiney is over forty, out looks moro youthful. When a boy he belonged to a band of young dreamers and htterah, publishing' manuscript journals. He became a clerk in a warehouse, Init continued a, deep student, of the Keltic language, occasionally publishing volumes of poems in bis spare time. Study enabled him to gain nn arts decree, and he then became a dramaust, his plays being produced in the Don Theatre. M'Swiney was a teacher under the County Council when ho sprang into political prominence with the- rise of the Irish \olnnteers. He became an organiser for the force, and it is said tliat, ho did great work in preventing a rising at Cork in 1916 synchronising nith that in Dublin, for tho lattor started in defiance of tho executive of one Volunteers. Subsequently he wm arrested and but was again arrested and deported. H e was finally freed in March 1919. While in. gaol he marnod Miss Marion Murphy, a beautiful and wealthy Cork heiress.