Green wave? Sorry, but the Irish have always ruled culture

Sure, aren't we Irish just brilliant, altogether? Look at us now there, on the world stage, showing them all how it’s done. Writers. Actors. Athletes. Artists. Musicians. A great bunch of lads (and lasses), so we are.

Not to sound too self-congratulatory, but it’s something we’ve always known, of course. Even so - blame the inbuilt aversion to notions, if you will - it’s been something that’s only occasionally reared its head over the years.

Like when Colin Farrell made it big in Hollywood: look at yer man there, with her arm around Britney Spears on the red carpet! He’s from Castleknock, did you know that? Or when Roy Keane captained Manchester United, or when Father Ted was the best sitcom on telly, or when Roddy Doyle won the Booker Prize, or when Sinead O’Connor or Enya were absolutely bossing the music world.

Ireland's dominance in global culture is no new thing, clearly: we’ve had literature covered with for many a year, from Joyce and Heaney, to Swift and Stoker. In film, we’ve had generations of legendary talent including Richard Harris, Peter O’Toole, Gabriel Byrne, Maureen O’Hara, Brenda Fricker… I could go on, and on. Music? How long have you got?

Saoirse Ronan says she wasn't expecting such a big reaction to the viral Graham Norton Show clip:

"I didn’t necessarily set out to make a splash but I do think there’s something really telling about the society that we’re in right now and about how open women want to be with the… pic.twitter.com/vkFaBuUnAr

— Pop Crave (@PopCrave) October 31, 2024

Still, the latest the cultural explosion - or the green wave, as it was dubbed around the time that The Banshees of Inisherin was doing the rounds during awards season - has recently been experiencing another surge thanks to a piece in pop culture bible Vulture amusingly titled 'The Pluck of the Irish’.

It examines ‘how the Irish came to rule pop culture’ and opens with the line: "When was the moment Ireland became cool?", going on to cite the examples of Normal People, Derry Girls, Hozier and Barry Keoghan’s "eight-pack" as evidence of Ireland’s supposedly newfound cultural kudos. We are, apparently, the "good Europeans", a new generation of Irish who are perceived by other nations as "hot and sad" (we’ll take it.)

So when was the moment Ireland became cool, you may ask? We've always been cool; it’s just taken the rest of the world this long to notice.

These sorts of features are usually only rolled out around St. Patrick’s Day and usually adopt a tone that wholeheartedly embraces Paddywhackery, which this piece at least avoids. Still, here in Ireland we’re well aware that our cultural prowess is not a recent development. Paul Mescal admittedly has a lot to answer for; not only has the Maynooth man become the biggest Irish actor of his generation, but his ‘nice guy’ persona has ensured that international audiences are now swooning over gold chains and GAA shorts.

Mescal is one of a certain breed of Irish star, the Vulture piece says, that maintains a down-to-earth diffidence that sets them apart. "While cinephiles shudder to learn the opinions of their favorite French actors," writer Nate Jones claims, "Irish stars are assumed to have respectable politics by default."

The truth is, it is remarkable that our comparatively tiny nation, which has a long history of cultural, societal and linguistic oppression and emigration, has thrived throughout generations - and not just the last few years - despite the circumstances. Ireland is basically the little weed that insists on breaking through a crack in the pavement.

Artists from Ireland continue to dominate popular culture. Online, they've gained a rep as the "good Europeans." https://t.co/9keleBpMGU

— Vulture (@vulture) November 18, 2024

I’ve interviewed a number of up-and-coming bands lately, many of whom have enjoyed a massively successful 2024. Several of them are in the ‘folk’ or at least ‘folk-adjacent’ category, and all of them had the same theory about the recent folk revival amongst a younger generation of musicians, from The Mary Wallopers to Lankum: it all comes back to our love of sharing stories. According to Ciaran ‘Gaff’ Gaffney, who founded the Seanchoíche storytelling platform in Dublin in 2022 - which now runs in various countries around the world - the current cultural boom is an extension of our tradition.

"We’re bringing back this old storytelling tradition that Ireland is really well-known for, but in a very contemporary way and a very multicultural way, too," he told me earlier this year. "We’ve had 1500 people share their stories so far, across 41 different nationalities and eight countries on four continents. So you’ll often get chatting to someone who’ll say ‘Oh god, I could never tell a story like the Irish can’, but I don’t think we have ownership of storytelling. Yes, we do have a cultural heritage and the wiring for storytelling, but I don’t think we can stop anyone else having a piece of the pie. You can unite so many different cultures and communities through storytelling; you can imagine the old Irish pubs on [New York’s] Lower East Side during the 1800s being packed with all kinds of immigrants, all sharing their stories. I feel like we’re kind of recreating that; it feels like we’re uniting people, and everyone can find themselves within the story."

Two nights at Alexandra Palace. Thanks London. pic.twitter.com/DYtlAMLN1h

— Fontaines D.C. (@fontainesdublin) November 25, 2024

I also recently spoke to Trevor Dietz, manager of Fontaines DC - who have swiftly become one of the biggest and most important Irish acts of their generation over the last five years. The band, he says, have been riding the crest of a cultural wave that has been in the making for quite a while. "For a country that is not in a great place [politically], creatively I think it’s the best that Ireland has ever been," he said. "And we should be really proud - not just of the incredible output on an international scale that the bands with guitars are doing, but in every facet of culture - from fashion, to movies, to whatever. I walked away from Glastonbury, and it was just a sea of Irish flags, Palestinian flags, and it was like ‘Holy s**t! There’s only five million of us’. And it’s not The Smiths or Oasis going ‘Our mam and dad are Irish’; these people were born and bred. It’s an incredible time. Maybe it’s because the politicians at the top are doing what they’re doing very badly, but something’s happening. And it’s a beautiful time to be Irish and abroad, going ‘Yeah, y’know what? We’re doing something right.’"

The Vulture piece does, however, make a very salient point about our record of investment in artists via various funding schemes. It remains a vital cog in our cultural wheel and as we saw during Covid, the importance of art and culture in our lives was more important than ever for both our mental health and our collective happiness. It’s crucial that our government continues to support artists - particularly during a cost of living crisis, when many of them simply do not have the financial capabilities to withstand day-to-day living. That will ensure that this so-called green wave, or reign over pop culture, or whatever else you want to call it - will continue to cause ripples long after the initial splash.

So when was the moment Ireland became cool, you may ask? We’ve always been cool; it’s just taken the rest of the world this long to notice. Now that they’re watching, let’s show them what else we can do.