麻豆社

How great artists and thinkers responded to the First World War in individual works of art.

To mark the centenary of the Easter Rising, this series of Minds at War explores how Irish artists were influenced by the First World War.

3. Poet and academic Gerald Dawe explores the little known poet Francis Ledwidge and his poem "O'Connell Street".

Francis Ledwidge served as a soldier in the British army and was killed in action in 1917. He wrote poetry constantly throughout his life, drawing on the inspiration of the countryside in which he grew up. But his early death meant that his work was never well known, although there has been a recent resurgence of interest and awareness of his talent.

The poem "O' Connell Street" was written when the poet returned to Dublin after serving abroad. It sums up how he saw the city in the wake of the Easter Rising with the influence of his army service. It also shows how Ledwidge's war poetry differed from the graphic representations of conflict by poets like Wilfred Owen. It was as if the reality of war was something Ledwidge wanted to circumvent or absorb into the pastoral idyll of his vision of a romantic Ireland.

Producer: Emma Kingsley.