WITBN

Round I: TG4

1. Fáiscthe as an Talamh (Wrested from the Land): 4 Episodes

Duration: 52 minutes / Post or Pre watershed

Behind the bare statistics about the current demise of small farming in Ireland lie thousands of individual stories. This documentary tells one of them as it chronicles the bittersweet change from the daily toil of farming to a more urban style of living that brings some comfort but also a palpable sense of loss.

Land that has been worked by the same family for hundreds of years changes hands – or lies fallow or unused. This program, produced by a talented young producer from the same locality, tracks a year in the life of a rural family in the Irish-speaking Connemara region in the West of Ireland and captures a defining moment – the decision to end fulltime farming on the family holding. Fáiscthe as an Talamh (‘Wrested from the Land’) brings us right into the lives of Séamus and Máirín de Búrca on their small farm as it lovingly and unobtrusively conveys a big story by its chronicling of small and mundane moments in one family’s life.

Beautifully filmed, it combines a lyrical chronicle of the yearly cycle on a working farm with a commentary on the harsh realities of the end of an era and the emotional conflict it can bring in a family.

A century ago, when Irish revolutionary thinker Patrick Pearse wanted to experience at first hand the reality and nobility of Irish peasant life, he headed west to Ros Muc, in the heart of Connemara. There he lived and wrote among the people and was inspired by and shared in their unique culture and language a way of life that had remained unchanged for centuries.

Now, a century later, all is changed. A combination of circumstances, new regulations and an absence of a cohesive policy have resulted in the ending of agriculture as the main source of income for thousands of Irish families.

2. Ag Bogadh go hInis Meáin (Moving to Inis Meáin) X 2

Duration: 52 minutes / Post or Pre watershed

These two programs illustrate the multi-faceted aspects of living year-round on a small island in the 21st century.

As with many small populated islands around the world that rely to some extent on Summer tourism, Inis Meáin (the ‘middle’ of the Aran islands off Ireland’s west coast), seems an idyllic place in which to live. Faced by the majestic Connemara mountains and the beauty of Galway Bay and with a backdrop of the Burren and the Cliffs of Moher, this is a jewel for the tourist who can spend a few hours admiring the pretty fields, the rocky outcrops, the prehistoric forts and tracing the steps of playwright John Millington Synge, whose writings first brought this island to the attention of the world.

Now, the island has its own airstrip, a thriving knitwear business with an international reputation and a core community of islanders trying to continue their traditional way of life. The Irish language remains the community language but there are also new settlers, young families with no previous connection to the island who have moved from the mainland in search of a different lifestyle. There are also individuals who have chosen to turn their back on the modern industrial global culture and come to live on the island and there are non-islanders who have married into what would have been regarded as a very tight-knit community.

The series throws a light on how these varying strands of island life combine in a program that is warm, honest and entertaining.