Merriman Summer School: The former Irish ambassador to Washington and chancellor of the University of Limerick, Seán Donlon, officially opening the Merriman Summer School in Lisdoonvarna at the weekend, sent out a "reminder" to the Provisional IRA of what was expected of it.
"If the Provisionals are, as their statement of last month says, committed to political and democratic programmes, it is incumbent on them to accept the Constitution fully and unconditionally," he said.
"They should disband the Provisional IRA. They should recognise the right of the people of Northern Ireland to choose its status and they should join with the main political parties here in seeking to win the consent of the majority in Northern Ireland to change its status.
"All of us accept that Provisional Sinn Féin have an electoral mandate in this jurisdiction. But it is not an unconditional mandate. It is a mandate derived from the Constitution, and no political party or individual has any right to be an a la carte constitutionalist".
In the opening lecture, Alan Titley, head of the Irish Department at St Patrick's College, Dublin City University, said that Merriman was what could be described as "just bawdy, or Rabelaisian, or ribald, or racy, or roguish". He added: "He is not smutty, sexy, not dirty nor sly, and definitely not erotic, and not impure, indecent, immodest or salacious."
Bawdiness was one of the traits of the "courts of poetry" and bawdiness was "more prevalent in the literature of Clare, Limerick and north Tipperary than in any other area".
The greatest bawdy poet contemporary of Merriman was Aindrias Mac Craith, who lived only a few miles away in Limerick: "It is entirely possible that Cuirt an Mhean Oíche (The Midnight Court) is one big elaborate and jokey commentary on the courts of poetry themselves."
Merriman, Mr Titley said, was a £5 or £10 a year schoolteacher in Feakle, Co Clare, at the end of the 18th century as well as being a small farmer and a poet.
"This is not an occupation conducive to sow your wild oats on every side. When he moved into Limerick it was probably a more respectable city than described by Frank McCourt".
Merriman, he added, was widely read and was familiar with French literature and, in particular, the writings of Rousseau.
Last night's lecture was by Dr Una Nic Éinrí, lecturer in Irish at Mary Immaculate College, Limerick.
Tonight, the lecture on "Merriman's Teaching Milieu and the Irish Teaching Tradition" will be given by John Coolahan, emeritus professor of education at NUI Maynooth.