In Memoriam
Edward Stack
Lecturer in Celtic Studies
UC Berkeley
1950-2016
As the summer of 2016 began in Berkeley, a shadow slowly passed over those of us who teach and learn Irish in the University of California, Berkeley’s Celtic Studies Program. Since 2011, the modern Irish segment of our program had come happily to depend on Edward “Eddie” Stack, a native Irish speaker from County Clare, for his exquisite skills as a teacher of Irish and for his dedication to our students. A writer, a musician, an active member of the Irish community in the Bay Area and in Ireland, Eddie Stack brought a wealth of talent to the University of California’s only Celtic Studies program. But the shadow that darkened our summer was the news of Eddie Stack’s unexpected and serious illness. Eddie Stack died on July 4, 2016. Many of us had already scattered for our summer tasks, so it was left to me to contact Eddie’s students, one by one, to say that their beloved teacher was not to return.
Eddie Stack taught in UC Berkeley’s Celtic Studies Program from 2011 to 2016. During the time that he was with us, Eddie strengthened the program by building enthusiasm for the modern Irish language among our brilliant students. Indeed, students from the diversity of disciplines that characterize the study of modern Irish — literature, linguistics, anthropology, folklore, history, etc. — all found a welcome home in Eddie’s classroom. Moreover, Eddie supported his students, in practical terms, by encouraging them to obtain summer funding in order to continue their language study in Ireland. I remember vividly how often I overheard Eddie on the phone in our shared office as he made a call to the Fulbright people or to colleagues at the National University of Ireland in Galway to help secure funding for us one way or another.
Indeed, it was by putting in this extra effort that Eddie oversaw a virtual renaissance of Irish language study at Berkeley. With Eddie Stack in charge of Irish language teaching, there blossomed a number of majors in the Celtic Studies Program, many of whom have gone on to study Irish in Ireland (at Trinity College, at the National University of Ireland in Galway), in Scotland (at the University of Edinburgh), in Cambridge, Mass. (at Harvard University’s Department of Celtic Languages and Literatures). Our students’ striking success was fostered not only by Eddie’s pedagogical skills but also by his knowledge of the ins-and-outs of securing opportunities on both sides of the Atlantic.
Not only in this regard is our loss profound.
For, while Eddie was with us, the life of the Celtic Studies Program became invigorated and dynamic. For example, it was through Eddie’s efforts that the distinguished Irish poet Louis de Paor spent the spring term of 2014 in Berkeley. As it turned out not only did Louis de Paor teach a stellar class based on his new collection of modern Irish poetry, but our students were taught about contemporary Irish poetry by a major Irish poet. The following year Louis continued to collaborate with the Celtic Studies Program on a digital humanities project, an online course taught in Galway and taken by both Galway and Berkeley students.
On another occasion, Eddie Stack hinted to me that Michael D. Higgins, president of Ireland, might visit Berkeley, and that his own friendship with the president might lead to a meeting with the students and faculty of Celtic Studies. Sure enough, in 2015, Michael D. Higgins visited Berkeley, during which time he made sure to include Eddie and our program in his busy schedule. On this occasion President Higgins announced the Irish government’s support for an Irish studies program in Berkeley’s Institute of European Studies, a program that complements the Celtic Studies Program in important ways. Indeed, one of our most vivid memories during Eddie Stack’s time at Berkeley is that President Higgins and his wife, Sabina, both warmly greeted our enthusiastic students and faculty in our elegant Morrison Library.
It should be noted that Eddie Stack’s early life and education in Ireland signaled the profound effect that he was to have on us all. He was born on November 4, 1950. Eddie’s primary school education was in Irish at CBS, Ennistymon, Co. Clare, with secondary education at Coláiste Éinde, Galway, a Gaeltacht school; he went on to receive his B.Eng. from University College, Galway, Ireland, after which he worked as an assistant county engineer in the Galway Gaeltacht, including the Aran Islands, before he emigrated to the U.S. in 1986.
Eddie Stack had a profound effect on the Irish scene beyond the Berkeley campus. When he arrived in San Francisco in 1988, he became an indispensable part of the local Irish community. Not only did he found a literary journal, The Island, but he also cofounded, in 1994, the Irish Studies Program at the New College of California in San Francisco, where he developed many of the pedagogical tools that he brought to us at Berkeley.
And now there is hardly space to point to his musicianship, as a folk artist who toured the U.S. in the 1970s. Still more, one of his legacies to Irish culture that must be mentioned is his authorship of published collections of stories that bring together storytelling qualities from his native Clare with what has been called a magical realism characteristic of the best contemporary international fiction.
During that last semester in 2016, Eddie designed and produced one of his finest publications. Simply entitled Doolin: People, Place, and Culture, it presents the folklife of a culturally-rich part of the country, one that was most close to his heart. Beautifully designed by Eddie Stack himself, the book was featured in an evening gathering that Berkeley’s Celtic Studies (together with Irish Studies) held at Wheeler Hall. That evening, Eddie spoke movingly about his time at Berkeley. Even as we mourn his loss, we can find comfort in recalling how warmly he felt toward his California home.
Eddie is survived by his children Aindrias, Éamon, Róisín, Jamie; his uncle, Seán Ó Súilleabháin; and his sisters, Pauline and Marie.
Thomas R. Walsh
2019
[1]
There is a man
whose sight for me would be a gracious gaze,
for whom I would give the whole world,
though it were an unequal bargain.
From: Early Irish Lyrics: Eighth to Twelfth century, ed. Gerard Murphy. Oxford: Clarendon Press, 1956: 161.
Painting credit: Portrait of Eddie Stack by Anthony Holdsworth
Eddie Stack taught in UC Berkeley’s Celtic Studies Program from 2011 to 2016. During the time that he was with us, Eddie strengthened the program by building enthusiasm for the modern Irish language among our brilliant students. Indeed, students from the diversity of disciplines that characterize the study of modern Irish — literature, linguistics, anthropology, folklore, history, etc. — all found a welcome home in Eddie’s classroom. Moreover, Eddie supported his students, in practical terms, by encouraging them to obtain summer funding in order to continue their language study in Ireland. I remember vividly how often I overheard Eddie on the phone in our shared office as he made a call to the Fulbright people or to colleagues at the National University of Ireland in Galway to help secure funding for us one way or another.
Indeed, it was by putting in this extra effort that Eddie oversaw a virtual renaissance of Irish language study at Berkeley. With Eddie Stack in charge of Irish language teaching, there blossomed a number of majors in the Celtic Studies Program, many of whom have gone on to study Irish in Ireland (at Trinity College, at the National University of Ireland in Galway), in Scotland (at the University of Edinburgh), in Cambridge, Mass. (at Harvard University’s Department of Celtic Languages and Literatures). Our students’ striking success was fostered not only by Eddie’s pedagogical skills but also by his knowledge of the ins-and-outs of securing opportunities on both sides of the Atlantic.
Not only in this regard is our loss profound.
For, while Eddie was with us, the life of the Celtic Studies Program became invigorated and dynamic. For example, it was through Eddie’s efforts that the distinguished Irish poet Louis de Paor spent the spring term of 2014 in Berkeley. As it turned out not only did Louis de Paor teach a stellar class based on his new collection of modern Irish poetry, but our students were taught about contemporary Irish poetry by a major Irish poet. The following year Louis continued to collaborate with the Celtic Studies Program on a digital humanities project, an online course taught in Galway and taken by both Galway and Berkeley students.
On another occasion, Eddie Stack hinted to me that Michael D. Higgins, president of Ireland, might visit Berkeley, and that his own friendship with the president might lead to a meeting with the students and faculty of Celtic Studies. Sure enough, in 2015, Michael D. Higgins visited Berkeley, during which time he made sure to include Eddie and our program in his busy schedule. On this occasion President Higgins announced the Irish government’s support for an Irish studies program in Berkeley’s Institute of European Studies, a program that complements the Celtic Studies Program in important ways. Indeed, one of our most vivid memories during Eddie Stack’s time at Berkeley is that President Higgins and his wife, Sabina, both warmly greeted our enthusiastic students and faculty in our elegant Morrison Library.
It should be noted that Eddie Stack’s early life and education in Ireland signaled the profound effect that he was to have on us all. He was born on November 4, 1950. Eddie’s primary school education was in Irish at CBS, Ennistymon, Co. Clare, with secondary education at Coláiste Éinde, Galway, a Gaeltacht school; he went on to receive his B.Eng. from University College, Galway, Ireland, after which he worked as an assistant county engineer in the Galway Gaeltacht, including the Aran Islands, before he emigrated to the U.S. in 1986.
Eddie Stack had a profound effect on the Irish scene beyond the Berkeley campus. When he arrived in San Francisco in 1988, he became an indispensable part of the local Irish community. Not only did he found a literary journal, The Island, but he also cofounded, in 1994, the Irish Studies Program at the New College of California in San Francisco, where he developed many of the pedagogical tools that he brought to us at Berkeley.
And now there is hardly space to point to his musicianship, as a folk artist who toured the U.S. in the 1970s. Still more, one of his legacies to Irish culture that must be mentioned is his authorship of published collections of stories that bring together storytelling qualities from his native Clare with what has been called a magical realism characteristic of the best contemporary international fiction.
During that last semester in 2016, Eddie designed and produced one of his finest publications. Simply entitled Doolin: People, Place, and Culture, it presents the folklife of a culturally-rich part of the country, one that was most close to his heart. Beautifully designed by Eddie Stack himself, the book was featured in an evening gathering that Berkeley’s Celtic Studies (together with Irish Studies) held at Wheeler Hall. That evening, Eddie spoke movingly about his time at Berkeley. Even as we mourn his loss, we can find comfort in recalling how warmly he felt toward his California home.
Eddie is survived by his children Aindrias, Éamon, Róisín, Jamie; his uncle, Seán Ó Súilleabháin; and his sisters, Pauline and Marie.
Fil duine
frismad buide lemm díuterc,
día tibrinn in m-bith m-buide,
h-uile h-uile, cid díupert. [1]
Thomas R. Walsh
2019
[1]
There is a man
whose sight for me would be a gracious gaze,
for whom I would give the whole world,
though it were an unequal bargain.
From: Early Irish Lyrics: Eighth to Twelfth century, ed. Gerard Murphy. Oxford: Clarendon Press, 1956: 161.
Painting credit: Portrait of Eddie Stack by Anthony Holdsworth
