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A special place, these three islands a few miles out in the Atlantic from Galway.

Nowadays they are usually reached not from the “city of the tribes” but by ferry service from Rossaveal, a town one hour’s coach ride west.

The Aran Islands and their few inhabitants are practically the archetype of age-old ways and a proud culture in eternal struggle with a magnificent but unforgiving natural realm.

No better way to grasp this (first; then go visit the place) than to watch the 1934 film Man of Aran, by Robert Flaherty, the American filmmaker who may well have created the documentary genre with Nanook of the North in 1925.

For more on the immense accomplishment of the making of Man of Aran, its reality as a fictional documentary, the controversy over its sensitivity to native ways, and its influence, click here to go to a full-length review from FilmWest, Ireland’s film quarterly.

For Wikipedia’s informative point-of-departure entry on the islands themselves, click here.

For reports from three individuals, peruse this list:

1. •An ex-soldier and polyglot from Connecticut who’s now doing her best to master a new language while in Ireland: Classical Greek!
   

2. •Our neighbor Eric, who first encouraged us to visit the islands as we were planning our month abroad
   

3. •Christine Finnegan herself
   

photo: http://www.flahertyseminar.org/?sb=7&mb=4; Flaherty/International Film Seminars