Europe Travel Blog

On Ireland’s east coast, at the mouth of the River Liffey, stands the the capital of the Republic of Ireland, Dublin. Steeped in art and literature, Dublin can claim to have produced three winners of the Nobel Prize for Literature, as Samuel Beckett, William Butler Yeats, and George Bernard Shaw were all born here. A number of writers from Dublin, notably James Joyce, Roddy Doyle and Maeve Binchy, have used the city itself as the convivial setting for their novels, so even if you don’t live here, you feel as if you know the place. Dublin has also produced Oscar Wilde, Jonathan Swift and Bram Stoker, the creator of Dracula. The legendary rock bands Thin Lizzy and U2 also hail from Dublin.

So it is not surprising then that Dublin is famous for its theaters, such as the Gaiety and the Olympia, and that it has a number of art museums, including the Irish Museum of Modern Art, and the National Gallery. On the artistic front, one thing that you definitely must see is the beautiful and fantastically illuminated manuscript known as the Book of Kells, which is on display in Trinity College, and was created by Celtic monks back in 800 AD.

There is a great nightlife in Dublin, as you may have gathered if you have seen the Alan Parker film “The Commitments”, based on the Roddy Doyle novel of the same name. The city center is full of interesting pubs, and you can try a glass of that famous Irish beer, Guinness, known locally in jest as “Liffey water”. Guinness is a dry stout, or dark beer, and is popular in the UK and other parts of the world too.

Possibly the most crowded and popular area of Dublin on an evening is Temple Bar, where on summer evenings the streets are buzzing with cheerful revelers, often watching the various street performers to be found there, and the pubs and restaurants are packed too. Temple Bar also has small music and theater venues, and is the home of the Irish Film Institute.

In Part 2, in a couple of days time, I will tell you about some of the other interesting things there are to see in Dublin.

Filed under: Culture, Art, Ireland - Eire, Nightlife