New source for Irish biographies

Are you an Irish Studies major? Are you of Irish descent (the whole year, not just on March 17)? A lover of Irish music, literature, coffee or pubs? Wolfhounds?

If you've said yes to any of these, you'll be interested in a new online resource the library has just acquired (the fact that Saint Patrick's Day is next week is mere coincidence).

The Dictionary of Irish Biography is "the most comprehensive and authoritative biographical dictionary yet published for Ireland". This web-based edition includes more than 9,000 signed biographies of historical figures from politics, religion, science and the arts. It is the result of a collaborative effort by the Royal Irish Academy and Cambridge University Press.

Irish poet Seamus Heaney calls the publication of the DIB "an epoch-making event in the history of Irish scholarship" while another Irish man of letters, Colm Toibin (who visited Saint Mary's not long ago), feels that it "will be greeted with delight by all those who study Irish literature and Irish history".

You can find the Dictionary of Irish Biography in the alphabetical Databases A-Z list on the library's web site, anytime, anywhere.

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