Eilís Dillon’s Followers (34)

Eilís Dillon

Born

in Galway, Ireland

March 07, 1920

Died

July 19, 1994

Website

http://www.eilisdillon.com/

Genre

Children's, Literature & Fiction, Mystery & Thrillers

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Eilís Dillon (1920-1994) was born in Galway, in the West of Ireland. Her father, Thomas Dillon, was Professor of Chemistry at University College Galway. Her mother, Geraldine Plunkett, was the sister of the poet Joseph Mary Plunkett, one of the seven signatories of the Proclamation of the Irish Republic, who was executed in Kilmainham Gaol at the end of the 1916 Easter Rising.

Eilís was educated at the Ursuline Convent in Sligo, and was sent to work in the hotel and catering business in Dublin. In 1940, at the age of 20, she married a 37-year-old Corkman. Her husband, Cormac Ó Cuilleanáin, became Professor of Irish at University College Cork. Eilís had always written poetry and stories, and in the intervals of bringing up three children and Eilís Dillon (1920-1994) was born in Galway, in the West of Ireland. Her father, Thomas Dillon, was Professor of Chemistry at University College Galway. Her mother, Geraldine Plunkett, was the sister of the poet Joseph Mary Plunkett, one of the seven signatories of the Proclamation of the Irish Republic, who was executed in Kilmainham Gaol at the end of the 1916 Easter Rising.

Eilís was educated at the Ursuline Convent in Sligo, and was sent to work in the hotel and catering business in Dublin. In 1940, at the age of 20, she married a 37-year-old Corkman. Her husband, Cormac Ó Cuilleanáin, became Professor of Irish at University College Cork. Eilís had always written poetry and stories, and in the intervals of bringing up three children and running a student hostel for the university, she developed her writing into a highly successful professional career. At first she wrote children's books in Irish and English, then started to write novels and detective stories. Over twenty of her books were published by Faber and Faber, winning critical acclaim and a wide readership. Her work was translated into fourteen languages.

In the 1960s, her husband's poor health prompted early retirement and a move to Rome. He died in 1970. Eilís Dillon's large historical novel about the road to Irish independence in the 19th and early 20th centuries, Across the Bitter Sea, was published in 1973 by Hodder & Stoughton in London, and Simon & Schuster in New York. It became an instant bestseller.

In 1974 Eilís married Vivian Mercier, Professor of English in the University of Colorado at Boulder. They moved to California when Vivian was appointed to a chair in the University of California, Santa Barbara. They spent each winter in California until Vivian's retirement in 1987, returning to Ireland for the spring and summer.

Eilís Dillon was active in a number of public and cultural bodies. She served on the Arts Council, the International Commission for English in the Liturgy, the Irish Writers' Union and the Irish Writers' Centre. She was a Fellow of the Royal Society of Literature, and a member of Aosdána, the State academy of writers, artists and composers. She had long argued for the establishment of such a body.

Vivian's death in 1989 was followed by the death in 1990 of Eilís's daughter Máire, who was a violinist with the London Philharmonic Orchestra. Despite these blows, and her own declining health, Eilís kept writing until the last months of her own life. An honorary doctorate was conferred on her by University College Cork in 1992. Her last two published works were Children of Bach (1993), a children's novel set in Hungary at the time of the Holocaust, and her edition of Vivian Mercier's posthumous Modern Irish Literature: Sources and Founders (Oxford, 1994). Her scholarly work on this book meant that her own last novel remained unfinished.

Eilís Dillon died on 19 July 1994. Of her fifty books, ten are now in print and others will shortly be republished. A special prize, the Eilís Dillon Award, is given each year as part of the Bisto Book Awards. She herself had won the main Bisto Book of the Year award in 1989 with The Island of Ghosts.

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Combine Editions
Eilís Dillon’s books

Average rating: 3.7 · 853 ratings · 147 reviews · 57 distinct works • Similar authors

	The Island of Horses 3.83 avg rating — 150 ratings — published 1956 — 8 editions	Error rating book. Refresh and try again. Rate this book Clear rating 1 of 5 stars 2 of 5 stars 3 of 5 stars 4 of 5 stars 5 of 5 stars
	Sent To His Account 3.75 avg rating — 113 ratings — published 1964 — 10 editions	Error rating book. Refresh and try again. Rate this book Clear rating 1 of 5 stars 2 of 5 stars 3 of 5 stars 4 of 5 stars 5 of 5 stars
	Death in the Quadrangle (An Inspector Kenny Mystery Book 2) 3.51 avg rating — 98 ratings — published 1986 — 10 editions	Error rating book. Refresh and try again. Rate this book Clear rating 1 of 5 stars 2 of 5 stars 3 of 5 stars 4 of 5 stars 5 of 5 stars
	Death at Crane's Court (An Inspector Kenny Mystery Book 1) 3.75 avg rating — 87 ratings — published 1953 — 9 editions	Error rating book. Refresh and try again. Rate this book Clear rating 1 of 5 stars 2 of 5 stars 3 of 5 stars 4 of 5 stars 5 of 5 stars
	The Bitter Glass 3.29 avg rating — 77 ratings — published 1958 — 6 editions	Error rating book. Refresh and try again. Rate this book Clear rating 1 of 5 stars 2 of 5 stars 3 of 5 stars 4 of 5 stars 5 of 5 stars
	The Lost Island by Eilís Dillon, Richard Kennedy (Illustrator) 3.92 avg rating — 53 ratings — published 1952 — 13 editions	Error rating book. Refresh and try again. Rate this book Clear rating 1 of 5 stars 2 of 5 stars 3 of 5 stars 4 of 5 stars 5 of 5 stars
	Across the Bitter Sea 3.90 avg rating — 50 ratings — published 1973 — 6 editions	Error rating book. Refresh and try again. Rate this book Clear rating 1 of 5 stars 2 of 5 stars 3 of 5 stars 4 of 5 stars 5 of 5 stars
	Im Schatten des Vesuv. by Eilís Dillon, Eilis Dilon 3.13 avg rating — 55 ratings — published 1977 — 7 editions	Error rating book. Refresh and try again. Rate this book Clear rating 1 of 5 stars 2 of 5 stars 3 of 5 stars 4 of 5 stars 5 of 5 stars
	Children of Bach 4.03 avg rating — 29 ratings — published 1992 — 4 editions	Error rating book. Refresh and try again. Rate this book Clear rating 1 of 5 stars 2 of 5 stars 3 of 5 stars 4 of 5 stars 5 of 5 stars
	A Family of Foxes by Eilís Dillon, Vic Donahue (Illustrator) 4.23 avg rating — 26 ratings — published 1964 — 15 editions	Error rating book. Refresh and try again. Rate this book Clear rating 1 of 5 stars 2 of 5 stars 3 of 5 stars 4 of 5 stars 5 of 5 stars

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Quotes by Eilís Dillon (?)

“What a fine thing to be as rude as that with such convictions.”
― Eilís Dillon, Death at Crane's Court: An Irish Mystery

tags: rudeness

6 likes

“I try not to look like a university man here....My fellow-guests think of a university degree as a disgraceful preliminary to the blood-sucking life of the bourgeoisie. A sign, moreover, that a man has to earn his own living.”
― Eilis Dillon, Death at Crane's Court: An Irish Mystery

tags: academic, professor

1 likes

“Mike wished Mr. Burden had chosen another time to be murdered. He was beginning to see that the hour of dressing for dinner might have been expressly designed for persons who need a quiet spell for the commission of crime.”
― Eilís Dillon, Death at Crane's Court: An Irish Mystery

tags: crime, murder

1 likes

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Eilís Dillon’s Followers (34)

Eilís Dillon

Combine EditionsEilís Dillon’s books

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Combine Editions
Eilís Dillon’s books