New film puts Cork-based literary hero in spotlight

A NEW documentary, Clouded Reveries, about the County Cork-based writer Doireann Ní Ghriofa, opens with the camera focusing on her hands as she taps out words on her laptop in her former home in the Richmond Hill area of Cork city.

The viewer then sees Doireann mouth the words, to test how they sound. It’s all part of her creative process, rooted in a devotion to language (both Irish and English) and the stories she grew up with in County Clare, as well as her domestic life and role as a mother.

For Glasheen native, Ciara Nic Chormaic, a film-maker based in Dublin, Doireann is one of her literary heroes. A big admirer of her poetry in particular, Ciara approached Doireann in 2019 about making a film about her.

Ciara’s output includes a film called Skin + Soul, which looks at the work of fashion photographer, Perry Ogden. She has also made documentaries for TG4 over the years.

“At the time, Doireann was working on a novel and she asked me if I wanted to take a look. That turned out to be A Ghost in the Throat, which went on an amazing journey. (It won awards including An Post Irish Book of the Year and was named as a New York Times ‘Notable Book of the Year’). The novel, part memoir, part literary investigation, has alternating chapters about the author’s role as a mother and artistic creator, and the life of Eibhlín Dubh Ní Chonaill, author of the 18th century Caoineadh Airt Uí Laoghaire.

As Nina McLaughlin of the New York Times wrote: “The book reveals, perhaps above all else, how we absorb what we love - a child, a lover, a poem - and how it changes us from the inside out.”

Amazingly, A Ghost in the Throat was largely written as Doireann sat in her car on the roof of a multi-storey car park in Ballincollig after dropping her daughter to creche.

The pandemic happened while Ciara was starting to shoot the documentary, which was funded by the Arts Council and TG4.

“Covid slowed down the filming process, but in fact, that was a good thing. It gave us more time to get to know one another.”

With her striking looks, as well as a slow, measured and rich speaking voice, Doireann, 41, is ideal material for a literary documentary.

“She’s an amazing person, so connected to language, culture and where she’s from. The film really became about her being drawn back to her late grandmother’s house (in Cill na Móna in Co Clare) as a source of inspiration.”

That home is revisited by Doireann in the documentary. There’s a stillness there, apart from the sound of a pendulum on a clock. For Doireann though, the house is still full of sounds.

She recalls her grandmother, her uncle Brendan and her father telling stories of people, some of whom had been dead for centuries. The past melds with the present.

Doireann isn’t so much haunted by ghosts but rather accompanied in life by her forebears. There is a mystical quality to this writer who relates the otherworldly story of how she started writing, when her dying grandfather seemed to bequeath the gift of writing to her.

Ciara is “fascinated” by the creative process of artists.

“There’s something quite magical about it. It’s hard to define and pin down.”

She adds that Doireann has “a real connection to the other world. The spirit world and the real world exist side by side.”

A mother-of-two young children, Ciara feels connected to Doireann who, like her, is a mother (of four) and an artistic creator. The domestic life is part of the documentary.

“It feeds into Doireann’s poetry. I think that’s what drew me to her work. Her poetry is just incredible. I do my best to represent it on screen. Her work is very visual.”

Clouded Reveries is also a love letter to Cork city. But instead of stock images of St Anne’s in Shandon and other well known city landmarks, Ciara’s camera is trained on narrow streetscapes evoking old Cork, as well as unusual angles of buildings and reflections in the river. There are shots of the clothes line, marshalled by crows, in Ciara’s back garden. There is a shot of a child’s Lego set which seems to be on the same table at which Doireann works. It’s a neat way of illustrating the author’s two roles.

Ciara studied Irish and Celtic Studies at NUI Galway. She went on to do a post graduate degree in film and television. She was a producer for more than 15 years and is now mostly a director. Clearly, Ciara knew what direction she was going in.

Not so with Doireann, who started off studying dentistry at UCC which involved first year medicine where dissecting bodies was part of the course. While she realised she had chosen the wrong degree, it wasn’t wasted.

“Studying the human body helped me to gain a deeper understanding of how life is composed of a series of layers, just like the layers in a human body.”

It helped Doireann to dig deeper - with the pen as opposed to the scalpel. She went on to study applied psychology and has a diploma in primary school teaching.

All this before feeling almost willed to write her first line of poetry.

Ciara traces Doireann’s creative process in the documentary, which she describes “as almost magical”.

Clouded Reveries is at the Gate Multiplex on October 9 at 8.30pm as part of IndieCork.