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Mary Beckett

Legacy

Mary Beckett, a writer, was born on January 28th, 1926, and passed away on November 13th, 2013. She was the third of four children born to school principal Seán Beckett and his wife Catherine in their home at 48 Knutsford Drive in Belfast, Northern Ireland. She entered a BBC radio contest with her debut short tale, "The expedition," in 1949. That article was published in The Bell, a Dublin-based monthly review of literature and social commentary, and it was broadcast by BBC Northern Ireland. She subsequently said that she was "extremely careful not to include a catholic or anything suggesting it in that novel because she feared that it would put a great target on her back as she was just beginning her writing career" since she was aware of the sectarian codes of her birthplace. The story won the competition and was the first of several that were broadcast on the BBC and RTÉ radio over the course of the following two years. "Here, we are separated by our religion and politics; in Dublin, it would appear, by our dialect" (The Bell, 18). She received support for her work from Peadar O'Donnell, a subsequent editor of The Bell, and David Marcus, who honored her and chose her story "Three Dreams Cross" for an Irish Writing special issue honoring female writers. She did, however, pick up writing again in the 1970s when David Marcus published her short tale "A Belfast Woman" in the Irish Press. But she took a sabbatical since juggling writing and being a wife and mother of five kids was challenging for her. She noted in Irish interview that it wasn't just because she was busy taking care of her family, but also because she had always written about Belfast and was worried about using Dublin's dialect correctly. When Seán McMahon, a publisher with Poolbeg Press, contacted David Marcus to encourage her to resume writing in 1979, she returned. She then released a collection with the same name in 1980 through Poolbeg. In 1987, Bloomsbury released her book Give Them Stones. Numerous anthologies contain stories by Beckett, and both the BBC and RTÉ radio have broadcast his works. Orla at School (1991), one of her children's novels, and Hannah or Pink Balloons are examples (1995). Additionally, the United States has published some of her writing. The work of Beckett was highly regarded. The Sunday Times hailed one of her books, "A Literary Woman," "a remarkable collection... enormously powerful." She also won the Sunday Tribune Arts Award in 1987 and was nominated for the Hughes Fiction Award in 1988. The Northern Ireland Arts Council simply noted that she was "one of the premier Irish writers" upon her passing.

References

K-Point Internet Solutions - Warrenpoint, N. (no date) Featured person, The Dictionary of Ulster Biography. Available at: http://www.newulsterbiography.co.uk/index.php/home/viewPerson/2053 (Accessed: December 1, 2022).

Beckett, mary (no date) Beckett, Mary | Dictionary of Irish Biography. Available at: https://www.dib.ie/biography/beckett-mary-a10098 (Accessed: December 1, 2022).

Beckett, mary (no date) Beckett, Mary | Dictionary of Irish Biography. Available at: https://www.dib.ie/biography/beckett-mary-a10098 (Accessed: December 1, 2022).

Mary Beckett (2022) Wikipedia. Wikimedia Foundation. Available at: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Mary_Beckett (Accessed: December 1, 2022).