Una Troy facts for kids

Una Troy Walsh (born May 21, 1910, died September 27, 1993) was a talented Irish writer. She wrote many novels and plays. You might know her work under her real name, Una Troy, or under her pen name, Elizabeth Connor.

Una Troy's Early Life

Una Troy was born in Fermoy, a town in County Cork, Ireland. Her father, John S. Troy, was a lawyer and a judge. Una had two sisters: Gráinne, who was a musician, and Shevaun, who was a poet. Una went to school at the Loreto Convent in Rathfarnham, Dublin.

Una Troy's Writing Career

Una Troy had a long and successful career as a writer. She started writing before World War II and continued for many years after.

Starting Her Writing Journey

Una Troy began her writing career in 1936. She used the pen name "Elizabeth Connor" for her first novel, Mount Prospect. This book was actually banned in the Irish Free State at the time.

Later, Mount Prospect was turned into a play. It won the Shaw Prize for new playwrights and was performed at the famous Abbey Theatre in Dublin in 1940. Two more of Una's plays, Swans and Geese and An Apple a Day, were also performed at the Abbey Theatre in the early 1940s.

In 1938, she published another novel called Dead Star's Light. The main character, John Davern, was inspired by a real Irish revolutionary named George Lennon. This book was not banned, but it did cause some discussion in her local church. Dead Star's Light was later performed as a play at the Abbey Theatre in 1947, under the new title The Dark Road.

Writing After World War II

After World War II, Una Troy started writing under her own name. She wrote more than fifteen novels during this time.

Her 1958 novel, Miss Maggie and the Doctor, was very popular. People said it felt truly Irish, full of energy and charm. Another of her books, The Other End of the Bridge (1959), was described by Kirkus Reviews as funny but also serious. It looked at common problems in a small Irish setting.

One of Una Troy's novels, We Are Seven (published in 1955), was made into a film called She Didn't Say No! in 1958. Una helped write the movie script. The film talked about some sensitive topics for the time, so it was not shown in Ireland for many years. A copy of the film was finally found in 2001 at the Irish Film Archive. It was then shown at the Museum of Modern Art in New York in 2005. In 2021, the film was made available online thanks to a European project.

Una Troy's Books

Here are some of the books Una Troy wrote:

• Mount Prospect (also known as No House of Peace, 1936)
• Dead Star's Light (1938)
• We Are Seven (1955)
• Miss Maggie and the Doctor (also known as Maggie, 1958)
• The Workhouse Graces (also known as The Graces of Ballykeen, 1959)
• The Other End of the Bridge (1960)
• Esmond (1962)
• The Brimstone Halo (also known as The Prodigal Father, 1965)
• The Benefactors (1969)
• The Castle Nobody Wanted (1970)
• Tiger Puss (1970)
• Doctor Go Home (1973)
• Out of Everywhere (1976)
• Caught in the Furze (1977)
• A Sack of Gold (1979)
• So True a Fool (1981)

Una Troy's Personal Life

In 1931, Una Troy married Joseph C. Walsh. He was a doctor for the Irish Republican Army (IRA) and later worked as a coroner. Una's sister-in-law, May Walsh, was married to the famous Irish artist Seán Keating.

Una and Joseph lived in Clonmel for most of their lives. They had one daughter named Janet (1932–2002). Una Troy became a widow when Dr. Walsh passed away in 1969. She herself died in 1993 in Bonmahon, County Waterford. Many of her writings and papers are kept safe at the National Library of Ireland.