Family In Irish Quotes & Sayings

I grew up in Manchester in a big Irish family - there are seven of us in all - so my life has always been about role-playing, about doing anything for a laugh. I'm always joking about; that's the way I am. — Shayne Ward

I was born into a working class Irish Catholic family at the brutal bottom of the Great Depression. I suppose this early imprinting and conditioning made me a life-long radical. My education was mostly scientific, majoring in electrical engineering and applied math. Those imprints made me a life-long rationalist. I have become increasingly skeptical about, or detached from, the assumption that radicalism and rationalism are the only correct perspectives with which to view life, but they remain my favorite perspectives. — Robert Anton Wilson

My mother's family were full-on Irish Catholics - faith in an elaborate old fashioned, highly conservative and madly baroque style. I sort of fell out of the tribe over women's rights and social justice issues when I was just 13 years old. — Geraldine Brooks

My grandmothers are Irish-American and German-American; my grandfather is from the Caribbean. My father is African-American. My family looked funny. I just started naturally imitating whoever I was talking to. I didn't want to be a phony, but I felt very authentic in the moment. — Sarah Jones

A day or so later, Gary David Goldberg, who created Family Ties and Spin City and Brooklyn Bridge and owns a house in the area, stops by the store looking for something to read. He picks up a copy of Must Love Dogs from the display. His five dogs are waiting for him in his car. He turns the book over and sees it's about a big Irish family. His wife, Diana Meehan, is from a big Irish family. — Claire Cook

Irish is the prominent nationality in the family, but beyond that, I really don't know. I see a lot of artistic or creative influence coming through on my mother's side. — William Wiley

Will gritted his teeth as Will Junior and Nellie continued their debate. He loved his son, but he found him
and many members of hisgeneration
ruthless in their pursuit of money and standing and harsh toward the less fortunate. He had reminded him on many occasions that both the McClanes and their mother's family
the Van der leydens
had at one time been immigrants. As had members of all the city's wealthy families. But Will's lectures made no difference to his son. He was an American. And those getting off the boat at Castle Garden were not. Italian, Irish, Chinese, Polish
nationality made no difference. They were lazy, stupid, and dirty. Their numbers spelled ruin for the country. p. 264 — Jennifer Donnelly

I grew up in a very old-fashioned Roman Catholic, Italian-Irish family in Philly. — Bradley Cooper

I grew up in an Irish Catholic family, and I think they force you to watch every James Cagney movie. — Jimmy Fallon

He was only the second or third in his sprawling family (their religion, Skip once said, was Irish Alcoholic) to ever go to college. Clan — Stephen King

My identity has always been confused. Born in Edinburgh of a Scottish/Russian/Jewish mother and an English/Irish/Catholic father, there is no form of guilt to which I was not subjected in my childhood. Members of my immediate family live all over the world - a diaspora of cousins, aunts, uncles and more in a dizzying mix. — Sara Sheridan

I grew up in a big Irish family, where everyone played the traditional sports, and I remember my grandfather saying to me, 'Why are you playing that communist game? You won't get anywhere with it.' — Danielle Fotopoulos

Growing up in an old-fashioned Bengali Hindu family and going to a convent school run by stern Irish nuns, I was brought up to revere rules. Without rules, there was only anarchy. — Bharati Mukherjee

I'm part German and part Irish. In fact, there's even a town in Germany that was named after my family, Limbach or so forth. And I don't know. I might even have some Indian blood in there. — Rush Limbaugh

My mother is Italian and my dad's Irish. In my family, we're expressive. Nobody holds back. — Kate Walsh

I was born into an Irish Catholic family in the New York area in this great, wonderful, and safe country, but the Holocaust has always haunted me, and it has long stood as a stumbling block to faith. How could such a thing be? How is that consistent with the concept of a loving God? — James Comey

When Edna O'Brien's first novel, 'The Country Girls,' was published in 1960, her family and neighbors in the small Irish village where she was born tossed copies into a bonfire expressly set for that horrifying purpose. — Alan Cheuse

Mr.s Kennedy toiled as a domestic servant and used her savings to start a notions and stationery store, which she gradually and skillfully expanded. Bridget's hard work and sacrifice, making her way as a widow in a strange land, established the funds her son P.J. Kennedy used to finance his liquor business. This enterprise was to become the basis of the family's future progress and put Bridget's descendants on a path that dazzled America and forever changed the political scene. — Rashers Tierney

Your brother?" St. Clair points above my bed to the only picture I've hung up. Seany is grinning at the camera and pointing at one of my mother's research turtles,which is lifting its neck and threatening to take away his finger. Mom is doing a study on the lifetime reproductive habits of snapping turtles and visits her brood in the Chattahoochie River several times a month. My brother loves to go with her, while I prefer the safety of our home. Snapping turtles are mean.
"Yep.That's Sean."
"That's a little Irish for a family with tartan bedspreads."
I smile. "It's kind of a sore spot. My mom loved the name,but Granddad-my father's father-practically died when he heard it.He was rooting for Malcolm or Ewan or Dougal instead."
St. Clair laughs. "How old is he?"
"Seven.He's in the second grade."
"That's a big age difference."
"Well,he was either an accident or a last-ditch effort to save a failing marriage.I've never had the nerve to ask which. — Stephanie Perkins

How did your mother die?" asked Delk.
"Car accident," Katie replied, gazing out over the water. "She'd been to mass. A tire blew on the way home, and she was gone. I was nineteen, Pather's age, when it happened. My brother was only eleven." She paused. "I do know what you're going through." Katie looked at her.
"Pather told you?" Katie nodded. Delk was glad Pather had told his sister; she was relieved not to have to tell the story again. "Does it ever ... you know ... get any better?"
Katie shrugged her narrow shoulders and smiled. "In some ways it does, but it's a bit like running a long race with a rock in your shoe. You get used to it, but it always hurts a little. — Suzanne Supplee

I'm such an odd mix of things. My grandfather was Indian: I've got more family living in India than I do in the U.K. My old man was East London. I was brought up in Yorkshire. My great-grandfather was Irish. — Sebastian Coe

On this day, millions of people ... throughout the world will gather to commemorate the life of Patrick, patron saint of Ireland. From his days as a slave in Ireland to his work as missionary years later, St. Patrick demonstrated a courage, commitment, and faith that won the hearts and minds of the Irish people. St. Patrick's Day also serves as a time for people of Irish descent from all traditions and religions to honor their native land and shared heritage. Their devotion to family, faith, and community has strengthened our country's character. — George W. Bush

For every nineteenth-century middle-class family that protected its wife and child within the family circle, there was an Irish ora German girl scrubbing floors in that home, a Welsh boy mining coal to keep the home-baked goodies warm, a black girl doing the family laundry, a black mother and child picking cotton to be made into clothes for the family, and a Jewish or an Italian daughter in a sweatshop making "ladies" dresses or artificial flowers for the family to purchase. — Stephanie Coontz

intriguing, not standard Hollywood stuff. He was not a street kid who'd had to claw his way to respectability. His reasonably well-to-do family's roots traced back to George Washington's mother, and he was always proud of the fact that he was distantly related to "one of the founders of our country." Bill was Irish-English-German, "mixed in an American shaker," as he liked to say. His maternal grandfather was a cousin of Warren G. Harding, twenty-ninth president of the United States. Bill had been born William Franklin Beedle Jr. in O'Fallon, Illinois, on April 17, 1918. When he was three, the family moved to Pasadena, California. His father, William, was an industrial chemist; his mother, Mary, a teacher. He had two younger brothers, Robert (Bob) Westfield Beedle, and Richard (Dick Porter) Beedle. — Edward Z. Epstein

My mother came from an Irish family of 11 kids and, of course, had a sister who was a nun, so I spent time at a convent and with an aunt and uncle who lived in New York and took me to the theater. — Ellen Pompeo

I grew up in a big Irish, Catholic family. My dad was a pretty rough guy. So one of my brothers left home when he was 15 and found his way to the gym. It gave me the opportunity to go and spend some time with him and work out in the gym. — Gerry Cooney

On St. Patrick's Day, the traditional Irish family would rise early and find a solitary sprig of shamrock to put on their somber Sunday best. Then they'd spend the morning in church listening to sermons about how thankful they should be that St. Patrick saved such a bunch of ungrateful sinners. Nobody wore green clothing as it was considered an unlucky color not suitable for church. — Rashers Tierney

My family, they're story tellers. My mom is Irish, and my dad is Italian. In my family, we weren't allowed to watch TV while we ate - we had to sit around the table and tell stories about our day. — Meg Cabot

Our atheism family tradition is traced to a - I don't know if it was great-great or a great-great-great grandmother who was a poor Irish-American woman in the 1880s in western Montana. — Barbara Ehrenreich

Thady begins his memoirs of the Rackrent Family by dating MONDAY MORNING, because no great undertaking can be auspiciously commenced in Ireland on any morning but MONDAY MORNING. 'Oh, please God we live till Monday morning, we'll set the slater to mend the roof of the house. On Monday morning we'll fall to, and cut the turf. On Monday morning we'll see and begin mowing. On Monday morning, please your honour, we'll begin and dig the potatoes,' etc.
All the intermediate days, between the making of such speeches and the ensuing Monday, are wasted: and when Monday morning comes, it is ten to one that the business is deferred to THE NEXT Monday morning. The Editor knew a gentleman, who, to counteract this prejudice, made his workmen and labourers begin all new pieces of work upon a Saturday. — Maria Edgeworth

I'm not sure I would make a direct connection between having press attention as a young person and being interested in the media as an older person. I came to it more organically, coming from a family of Irish Catholic storytellers. Storytelling is a pastime and important part of my family's history and culture. — Rory Kennedy

I went to a Catholic University and there's something about being a Catholic-American. You know, St. Patrick's Day is, I'm Irish-Catholic. There's alcoholism in my family. It's like I've got to be Catholic, right? — Jim Gaffigan

I became an American citizen three years ago, and if I'd been arrested, maybe that wouldn't have happened. That was a very proud moment, by the way. I still have my Irish passport, but becoming an American citizen was important in terms of my family. — Jason O'Mara

My family was very encouraging, and both of my grandparents were both beautiful singers. My grandmother was a coloratura soprano, and my grandfather was an Irish tenor in a barbershop quartet. — Clare Bowen

Sean's Bar on Main Street, Athlone, on the West Bank of the River Shannon, claims to be the oldest pub in Ireland, dating back to AD 900. The bar holds records of every owner since its opening, including gender-bending pop sensation Boy George (born George Alan O'Dowd to an Irish family), who the premises briefly in 1987 — Rashers Tierney

In life, we all have a cross to bear and a unique story to tell. We just hope that someone will take the time to listen. — Greg McVicker

I've always liked it here. Part of me is Irish. My family comes from the west coast, so whenever I come to Ireland I get a wee tingling in my heart that I'm where I belong. — Billy Connolly

It's like an Irish family. They fight like hell among themselves. They want nothing to do with each other. But you throw a disaster at them, and they're all shoulder to shoulder and they'll do whatever it takes. They don't stop for one minute to think what their personal cost or toll is going to be in it, they just do it. — Laurence Gonzales

Dean Mohamet, a Muslim landowner from Patna who had followed his British patron to Ireland. There he soon eloped with, and later marries, Jean Daly, from a leading Anglo-Irish family ... In 1807 Dean Mohamet moved to London where he opened the country's first Indian owned curry restaurant, Dean Mohamet's Hindoostanee Coffee House : ... He finally decamped to Brighton where he opened what can only be described as Britain's first oriental massage parlour and became "Shampooing Surgeon to Kings George IV and William IV. " — William Dalrymple

Gillian had bought the table and chairs and beds, the whole of the family furniture second-hand weekly down in the open air second hand stalls on Dublin quay. The women who ran these stalls were called the Shawlie Maggies and they saw her bruises and heard the stories of her husband the local drunk and gambler, the husband from hell and gave her cheaply some second hand clothes and some fruit and vegetables for the kids and herself. It was for Gillian and the kids a tough life with many disappointments. Despite this Gillian had a solid head on her shoulders and a great sense of humour and this got her through the worst of times. — Annette J. Dunlea

Amongst Women concentrated on the family, and the new book concentrates on a small community. The dominant units in Irish society are the family and the locality. The idea was that the whole world would grow out from that small space. — John McGahern

The phrase "the violent bear it away" fascinated the 20th century Irish-American storyteller Flannery O'Connor, who used it as the title of one of her novels. O'Connor's surname connects her to an Irish royal family descended from Conchobor (pronounced "Connor"), the prehistoric king of Ulster who was foster father to Cuchulainn and "husband" of the unwilling Derdriu. In the western world, the antiquity of Irish lineages is exceeded only by that of the Jews. — Thomas Cahill

I'm more from a double world where I wasn't part of anything or invested in anything, because I was Irish, and very Irish, but also the other part of my family, not that it had airs, or money, was descended from the first minister on Cape Ann in the 1620s. — William Monahan