1900-05-22 to Douglas Hyde

Autograph letter signed, National Library of Ireland, 235 words

[Edited for paragraph breaks, capitalization, spelling and punctuation.]

92 VICTORIA STREET. S.W.

Tuesday night [22 May 1900]

Dear Douglas Hyde,

I have read Lady Gregory’s translations of your Irish poems and wish I could find words to express my admiration for them. They are as good as Villon and Heine and will be read always as Horace is read by scholars if the language dies, if you do not succeed in saving the language.

The extraordinary merit of your poems you owe in a great measure to the language, you are writing in young language, in a language young as English was in Shakesperean days. Speak Irish, write Irish, think Irish: you are a shadow among shadows in the shadow world of English.

Tell our friend Concannon to write his book. You are the lucky one, you will write things that will live and though we had ten times the talent we have we shall pass as the wind passes.

My brother Major Moore is learning Irish in the Transval under a rock amid the shriek of shells and the singing sound of bullets and is determined to bring his children up in the Irish language. He is enthusiastic about my speech. I wish I could do more.

Always yours

George Moore

If you come to London, come to see me.