Irish Writers - Christy Brown

Christy Brown was born in Crumlin, Dublin, in 1932. One of thirteen surviving children, he suffered from cerebral palsy and was considered mentally disabled until he famously snatched a piece of chalk from his sister with his left foot. His autobiography, My Left Foot (London, Secker & Warburg, 1954/New York, Simon & Schuster, 1955), was later expanded into the novel Down All The Days (Secker & Warburg/ New York/Stein & Day, 1970), and became an international best seller, being translated into fourteen languages. There followed other novels including A Shadow on Summer (Secker & Warburg/Stein & Day, 1976). He also published a number of poetry collections including Come Softly to My Wake (Secker & Warburg, 1971), published in America as Poems of Christy Brown (New York, Stein & Day, 1971); Background Music: Poems (Secker & Warburg/Stein & Day, 1973); Of Snails And Skylarks (Secker & Warburg,1978); and Wild Grow the Lilies (Secker & Warburg/Stein & Day, 1976). With his wife Mary Carr he settled in Ballyheigue, Co Kerry, and also in Parbrook, Somerset, UK, where he died in 1981. My Left Foot, with a screenplay by Shane Connaughton, was filmed by Jim Sheridan in 1989, with Daniel Day Lewis and Brenda Fricker as Christy and his mother.

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