Brendan Francis Aidan Behan^[1] (christenedFrancis Behan)^[2] (/ˈbiːən/BEE-ən;Irish:Breandán Ó Beacháin; 9 February 1923 – 20 March 1964) was an Irish poet, short story writer, novelist,playwright, andIrish Republican,^[3] an activist who wrote in both English and Irish. His widely acknowledgedalcohol dependence, despite attempts to treat it, impacted his creative capacities and contributed to health and social problems which curtailed his artistic output and finally his life.^[4]

Brendan Behan
Behan (left) with actorJackie Gleason in 1960
Born	Brendan Francis Aidan Behan (1923-02-09)9 February 1923 Dublin, Ireland
Died	20 March 1964(1964-03-20) (aged 41) Dublin, Ireland
Occupation	Writer
Period	1942–1964
Genre	Poet, novelist, playwright
Subject	Irish republican struggle, often autobiographical
Notable works	The Quare Fellow The Hostage Borstal Boy
Spouse	Beatrice ffrench Salkeld ​ ​ (m. 1955)​
Children	Blanaid Behan
Parents	Stephen Behan (father) Kathleen Behan (mother)
Relatives	Dominic Behan (brother) Brian Behan (brother)

AnIrish Republican and avolunteer in theIrish Republican Army (IRA), Behan was born inDublin into a staunchly republican family, becoming a member of the IRA's youth organizationFianna Éireann at the age of fourteen. There was also a strong emphasis onIrish history andculture in his home, which meant he was steeped in literature and patriotic ballads from an early age. At the age of 16, Behan joined the IRA, which led to his serving time in aborstal youth prison in the United Kingdom and imprisonment inIreland. During this time, he took it upon himself to study and became a fluent speaker of theIrish language. Subsequently released from prison as part of a general amnesty given by theFianna Fáil government in 1946, Behan moved between homes in Dublin,Kerry andConnemara and also resided inParis for a time.

In 1954, Behan's first play,The Quare Fellow, was produced inDublin. It was well received; however, it was the 1956 production atJoan Littlewood'sTheatre Workshop in Stratford, London, that gained Behan a wider reputation. This was helped by a famous drunken interview onBBC television withMalcolm Muggeridge. In 1958, Behan's play in the Irish language,An Giall had its debut at Dublin'sDamer Theatre. Later,The Hostage, Behan's English-language adaptation ofAn Giall, met with great success internationally. Behan'sautobiographical novel,Borstal Boy, was published the same year and became a worldwide best-seller.

By the early 1960s, Behan reached the peak of his fame. He spent increasing amounts of time inNew York City, famously declaring, "ToAmerica, my new found land: The man that hates you hates the human race."^[5] By this point, Behan began spending time with various prominent people such asHarpo Marx andArthur Miller and was followed by a youngBob Dylan.^[6] However, this newfound fame did nothing to aid his health or his work, with his alcohol dependence and diabetic conditions continuing to deteriorate.Brendan Behan's New York andConfessions of an Irish Rebel received little praise. He briefly attempted to combat this by a dry stretch while staying at theChelsea Hotel in New York, and in 1961 was admitted to Sunnyside Private Hospital,^[7] an institution for the treatment of alcohol dependence inToronto, but he once again turned back to alcohol and relapsed back into active alcohol use.

Behan was born in the inner city of Dublin at Holles Street Hospital on 9 February 1923 into an educated working-class family.^[8]

His mother,Kathleen Behan, née Kearney, had two sons, Sean Furlong and Rory (Roger Casement Furlong), from her first marriage to compositor Jack Furlong; after Brendan was born she had three more sons and a daughter: Seamus, Brian, Dominic and Carmel.^[9]

They first lived in a house on Russell Street nearMountjoy Square owned by his grandmother, Christine English, who owned a number of properties in the area. Brendan's fatherStephen Behan, a house painter who had fought in theWar of Independence, read classic literature to the children at bedtime including the works ofZola,Galsworthy, andMaupassant; their mother Kathleen took them on literary tours of the city. She remained politically active all her life and was a personal friend of the Irish leaderMichael Collins. Kathleen published her autobiography,Mother of All The Behans, a collaboration with her son Brian, in 1984.

Brendan Behan wrote a lament to Collins,The Laughing Boy, at the age of thirteen. The title was from the affectionate nickname Mrs Behan gave to Collins.

Behan's unclePeadar Kearney wrote The Soldier's Song, which became the Irish national anthemAmhrán na bhFiann when translated into Irish.^[8] His brotherDominic was also a songwriter, best known for the songThe Patriot Game;^[10] His brotherBrian was a prominent radical political activist and public speaker, actor, author, and playwright.^[11][12][13]

BiographerUlick O'Connor wrote that one day, aged eight, Brendan was returning home with his granny and a friend from a pub. A passer-by remarked, "Oh, my! Isn't it terrible, ma'am, to see such a beautiful child deformed?" "How dare you," joked his granny. "He's not deformed; he's just drunk!"

In 1937, the Behan family moved to a newly-built local council housing scheme in Kildare Road,Crumlin, then seen by Dubliners as the countryside – Stephen muttered that the working classes were being sent "To Hell or to Kimmage" a parody ofOliver Cromwell's demand that the Irish be sent "To Hell or to Connacht". At this stage, Behan left school at 13 to enter an apprenticeship to follow in his father's and both grandfathers' footsteps as a house painter.^[8]

Behan became a member ofFianna Éireann, the boy scout group of theAnti-Treaty IRA. He published his first poems and prose in the organisation's magazine,Fianna: the Voice of Young Ireland. In 1931 he also became the youngest contributor to be published inThe Irish Press with his poemReply of Young Boy to Pro-English verses.

At 16, Behan joined the IRA and embarked on an unauthorised solo mission to England to set off a bomb atCammell Laird shipyard. He was arrested while in possession ofexplosives. British prosecutors tried to persuade him to testify against his IRA superiors and offered in return to relocate him under a new name to Canada or another distant part of theBritish Commonwealth.

Refusing to be turned, the 16-year-old Behan was sentenced to three years in aborstal (Hollesley Bay,^[14] once under the care ofCyril Joyce^[15]) and did not return to Ireland until 1941. He wrote about the experience in the memoirBorstal Boy.

In 1942, during thewartimestate of emergency declared by IrishTaoiseachÉamon de Valera, Behan was arrested by theGarda Síochána following a protest of the execution of IRA manGeorge Plant^[16] Later that same year Behan was arrested at another commemoration - which the IRA had planned to take place during a Dublin commemoration ceremony forTheobald Wolfe Tone. When the group of IRA men were confronted by the police one member pointed his revolver at them but did not fire. Behan urged him to "use it use it", when no shot was fired Behan shouted: "Give it to me and I will shoot the bastards". When Behan received the gun he fired two shots at police and escaped the scene but was later arrested (10 April 1942). ”^[17] He was put on trial forconspiracy to murder and theattempted murder of two Garda detectives, Behan was found guilty and sentenced to 14 years imprisonment.^[18]

He was first incarcerated inMountjoy Prison in Dublin where he sketched out his play The Quare Fellow, based on a fellow prisoner.^[19] In June 1944 Behan wasinterned both with other IRA men and withAllied andGerman airmen at theCurragh Camp inCounty Kildare. He later related his experiences there in his memoirConfessions of an Irish Rebel. Released under a generalamnesty for IRA prisoners and internees in 1946, Behan's active IRA career was largely over by the age of 23. Aside from a short prison sentence in 1947 for trying to break an imprisoned IRA man out of prison inManchester, Behan effectively left the organisation but remained friends with the IRAs long termChief of StaffCathal Goulding.^[20]

Behan's prison experiences were central to his writing career. In Mountjoy, he wrote his first play,The Landlady and also began to write short stories and other prose. It was a literary magazine calledEnvoy (A Review of Literature and Art), founded byJohn Ryan, that first published Behan's short stories and his first poem. Some of his early work was also published inThe Bell, the leading Irish literary magazine of the time. He learned Irish in prison and began writing plays. In late 2024 Dublin playwrightJimmy Murphy discovered act 1 of a lost first play by Behan, "The Rent Woman" in the Archives of the National Library of Ireland, alongside Behan's handwritten acts 2 and 3 of a play in Irish called An Bean Ciósa, a direct translation of The Rent Woman.^[21] After his release in 1946, he spent some time in theGaeltacht areas of countiesGalway andKerry, where he started writing poetry in Irish.

During this period he was employed by theCommissioners of Irish Lights,^[22] where the lighthouse keeper ofSaint John's Point, County Down, recommending his dismissal, described him as “the worst specimen” he had met in 30 years of service, adding that he showed "careless indifference" and "no respect for property".^[23][24]

He left Ireland and all its perceived social pressures to live in Paris in the early 1950s. There, he felt he could lose himself and release the artist within. Although he still drank heavily, he managed to earn a living, supposedly by writing pornography.^{[citation needed]} He returned to Dublin and began to write seriously, and to be published in serious papers such asThe Irish Times, for which he wrote In 1953, drawing on his extensive knowledge of criminal activity in Dublin and Paris, he wrote a serial that was later published asThe Scarperer.

Throughout the rest of his writing career, he would rise at seven in the morning and work until noon, when the pubs opened. He began to write for radio, and his playThe Leaving Party was broadcast. Literary Ireland in the 1950s was a place where people drank. Behan cultivated a reputation as carouser-in-chief and swayed shoulder-to-shoulder with other literati of the day who used the pub McDaid's as their base:Flann O'Brien,Patrick Kavanagh,Patrick Swift,Anthony Cronin,John Jordan,J. P. Donleavy and artistDesmond MacNamara whose bust of Behan is on display at the National Writers Museum. Behan fell out with the spiky Kavanagh, who reportedly would visibly shudder at the mention of Behan's name and who referred to him as "evil incarnate".^[25]

Behan's fortunes changed in 1954, with the appearance of his playThe Quare Fellow. Originally calledThe Twisting of Another Rope and influenced by his time spent in jail, it chronicles the vicissitudes of prison life leading up to the execution of "The quare fellow", a character who is never seen. The prison dialogue is vivid and laced with satire but reveals to the reader the human detritus that surrounds capital punishment. Produced in thePike Theatre, in Dublin, the play ran for six months. In May 1956,The Quare Fellow opened in theTheatre Royal Stratford East, in a production byJoan Littlewood'sTheatre Workshop. Subsequently, it transferred to the West End. Behan generated immense publicity forThe Quare Fellow as a result of a drunken appearance on theMalcolm Muggeridge TV show. The English, relatively unaccustomed to public drunkenness in authors, took him to their hearts. A fellow guest on the show, Irish-American actorJackie Gleason, reportedly said about the incident: "It wasn't an act of God, but an act of Guinness!" Behan and Gleason went on to forge a friendship. Behan loved the story of how, walking along the street in London shortly after this episode, aCockney approached him and exclaimed that he understood every word he had said—drunk or not—but had not a clue what "that bugger Muggeridge was on about!" While addled, Brendan would clamber on stage and recite the play's signature song,The Auld Triangle. The transfer of the play to Broadway provided Behan with international recognition. Rumours still abound that Littlewood contributed much of the text ofThe Quare Fellow and led to the saying, "Dylan Thomas wroteUnder Milk Wood, Brendan Behan wrote under Littlewood". Littlewood remained a supporter, visiting him in Dublin in 1960.^[26]

In 1958, his Irish-language playAn Giall (The Hostage) opened in the Damer Theatre, Dublin. Reminiscent of Frank O'Connor'sGuests of the Nation, it portrays the detention in a teeming Dublin house in the late 1950s of a Britishconscript soldier, seized by the IRA as ahostage pending the scheduled execution in Northern Ireland of an imprisoned IRA volunteer. The hostage falls in love with an Irishconvent girl, Teresa, working as a maid in the house. Their innocent world of love is incongruous among their surroundings since the house also serves as abrothel. In the end, the hostage dies accidentally during a bungled police raid, revealing the human cost of war, a universal suffering. The subsequent English-language versionThe Hostage (1958), reflecting Behan's own translation from the Irish but also much influenced by Joan Littlewood during a troubled collaboration with Behan, is a bawdy, slapstick play that adds a number of flamboyantly gay characters and bears only a limited resemblance to the original version.

His autobiographical novelBorstal Boy followed in 1958. In the vividmemoir of his time in St Andrews House, Hollesley Bay Colony Borstal, near Woodbridge, Suffolk, England. (The site of St Andrews House is now a Category D men's prison and Young Offenders Institution). An original voice in Irish literature boomed out from its pages. The language is both acerbic and delicate, the portrayal of inmates and "screws" cerebral. For a Republican, though, it is not a vitriolic attack on Britain; it delineates Behan's move away from violence. In one account, an inmate strives to entice Behan into chanting political slogans with him. Behan curses and damns him in his mind, hoping that he would cease his rantings-hardly the sign of a troublesome prisoner. By the end, the idealistic boy rebel emerges as a realistic young man, who recognises the truth: violence, especially political violence, is futile. The 1950s literary criticKenneth Tynan said: "If the English hoard words like misers... Behan sends them out on a spree, ribald, flushed, and spoiling for a fight." He was now established as one of the leading Irish writers of his generation.

Behan revered the memory of FatherWilliam Doyle, a Dublinpriest of theSociety of Jesus, who served asmilitary chaplain to theRoyal Dublin Fusiliers as they fought in the trenches of theWestern Front. Father Doyle waskilled in action while running to the aid of wounded soldiers from his regiment during theBattle of Passchendaele in 1917. Behan expressed his affection for Father Doyle's memory in the memoirBorstal Boy.Alfred O'Rahilly's 1920 biography of the fallen chaplain was one of Behan's favourite books.^[27]

In February 1955, Behan married horticultural illustrator forThe Irish Times,Beatrice Ffrench Salkeld, daughter of the painterCecil Ffrench Salkeld. A daughter, Blanaid, was born in 1963, shortly before Behan's death.^[8] Various biographies have established that Behan was bisexual to some degree.^[28][29]

Behan found fame difficult. He was a long-term heavy drinker (describing himself, on one occasion, as "a drinker with a writing problem" and claiming "I only drink on two occasions—when I'm thirsty and when I'm not") and developeddiabetes in the early 1950s but this was not diagnosed until 1956.^[8] As his fame grew, so too did his alcohol addiction. This combination resulted in a series of famously drunken public appearances, on both stage and television. Behan's favourite drink was champagne and sherry.

The public wanted the witty, iconoclastic, genial "broth of a boy", and he gave that to them in abundance, once exclaiming: "There's no bad publicity except an obituary." His health suffered, withdiabetic comas andseizures occurring regularly. The public who once extended their arms now closed ranks against him; publicans flung him from their premises. His books,Brendan Behan's Island,Brendan Behan's New York andConfessions of an Irish Rebel, published in 1962 and 1964, were dictated into a tape recorder because he was no longer able to write or type for long enough to be able to finish them.^[30]

Behan died on 20 March 1964 after collapsing at the Harbour Lights bar (now Harkin's Harbour Bar) in Echlin Street, Dublin. He was transferred to theMeath Hospital in central Dublin, where he died, aged 41. At his funeral, he was given a full IRA guard of honour, which escorted his coffin. It was described by several newspapers as the biggest Irish funeral of all time after those ofMichael Collins andCharles Stewart Parnell.^[31]

Acclaimed Irish sculptorJames Power sculpted Brendan Behan's death mask.^[32]

Following his death, his widow had a son,Paudge Behan, withCathal Goulding,Chief of Staff of theIrish Republican Army and theOfficial IRA.^[33]

Behan had a one-night stand in 1961 with Valerie Danby-Smith,^[34][35] who wasErnest Hemingway's personal assistant and later married his daughter,Gloria Hemingway.^[36] Nine months later, Valerie gave birth to a son she named Brendan. Brendan Behan died two years later, having never met his son.^[35]

Behan is frequently mentioned in works of popular culture. His work has been a significant influence in the writings ofShane MacGowan, and he is the subject ofStreams of Whiskey, a song byThe Pogues. The Pogues'Thousands Are Sailing written by lead guitarist Philip Chevron, features the lyricand in Brendan Behan's footsteps / I danced up and down the street. Behan is also referenced inDamien Dempsey's 'Jar Song'. Behan's version of the third verse ofThe Internationale, fromBorstal Boy was reproduced on theLP sleeve ofDexys Midnight Runners's debut album,Searching for the Young Soul Rebels.

He was named by the US websiteIrish Central as one of the greatest Irish writers of all time.^[38]

Australian singer-songwriterPaul Kelly wroteLaughing Boy as a tribute to Behan, and it was covered byWeddings, Parties, Anything on theirRoaring Days album. TheMighty Mighty Bosstones 2000 albumPay Attention features the songAll Things Considered, which contains the lyricsMost of what he tells us no one's verified / He swears he was there the day that Brendan Behan died.

Behan is referenced inThinking Voyager 2 Type Things, a song from the 1990Bob Geldof album,Vegetarians of Love, with the lyricsSo rise up Brendan Behan and like a drunken Lazarus / Let's traipse the high bronze of the evening sky like crack crazed kings.

Chicago-based bandThe Tossers wrote the songBreandan Ó Beacháin, released on their 2008 albumOn A Fine Spring Evening. Shortly after Behan's death a student, Fred Geis, wrote the songLament for Brendan Behan and passed it on to theClancy Brothers, who sang it on their albumRecorded Live in Ireland the same year. This song, which calls "bold Brendan" Ireland's "sweet angry singer", was later covered by the Australian trio TheDoug Anthony All Stars, better known as a comedy band, on their albumBlue.Brendan is Seamus Robinson's song tribute to Behan. Behan's prison songThe Auld Triangle (which featured in his playThe Quare Fellow —this term being prison slang for a prisoner condemned to be hanged), has become a standard and has been recorded on numerous occasions by folk musicians as well as popular bands such asThe Pogues,The Dubliners, theDropkick Murphys and TheDoug Anthony All Stars. Behan is also referenced in the opening line ofthe Mountain Goats songCommandante, where the narrator proclaims that he will "drink more whiskey than Brendan Behan".

Behan's two poems from his workThe Hostage,On the Eighteenth Day of November andThe Laughing Boy were translated into Swedish and recorded byAnn Sofi Nilsson on the albumNär kommer dagen. The same poems were translated in 1966 to Greek and recorded byMaria Farantouri on the albumΈνας όμηρος (The hostage) byMikis Theodorakis.

Irish actorShay Duffin wrote and performed a one-person show in which he portrayed Behan.^[39]

A pub named after Behan is located in theJamaica Plain section ofBoston, Massachusetts. A bronze sculpture of the writer sits on the banks of the Royal Canal, while a bronze of Behan's head sits inside Searson's bar, one of his watering holes, on Pembroke Road, Dublin..^[40]

According to J.P. Donleavy'sHistory of The Ginger Man, Behan was instrumental in bringing Donleavy in contact with M. Girodios of Olympia Press (Paris) to help Donleavy's first novel,The Ginger Man, be published despite its having been ostracised by the world literature community for its "filth" and "obscenity".

In the season 4Mad Men episodeBlowing Smoke, which premiered on 10 October 2010, Midge Daniels introduces Don to her playwright husband, Perry, and says, "When we met, I said he looked like Brendan Behan."

In May 2011,Brendan at the Chelsea, written by Behan's nieceJanet Behan, was the first play performed in the Naughton Studio at the newLyric Theatre in Belfast. The production tells the story of Behan's residence at New York'sHotel Chelsea in 1963. It was a critical success and is being revived for a tour to Theatre Row in New York in September 2013 before returning to the Lyric in October 2013.

Morrissey's 2014 songMountjoy references the writer:Brendan Behan's laughter rings / For what he had or hadn’t done / For he knew then as I know now / That for each and every one of us / We all lose / Rich or poor, / We all lose / Rich or poor, they all lose.^[41][42]

In 1959, on the AlbumSongs for Swingin' Sellers,Peter Sellers parodies Behan's TV interviews in the sketch 'In a Free State' - an interview with Mr Bedham, an Irish playwright who is "slurred, angry, panting and ready to commit murder to get at a drink". According to the journalist William J. Weatherby, Behan's wife admired Sellers' impersonation of her husband and considered Bedham's references to "the thirst" the most accurate part of the sketch. The Sketch was written by Max Schreiner with music byRon Goodwin.

• The Quare Fellow (1954)
• An Giall (The Hostage) (1958)
  • Behan wrote the play in Irish and translated it to English.
• Richard's Cork Leg (1972)
• Moving Out (one-act play, commissioned for radio)
• A Garden Party (one-act play, commissioned for radio)
• The Big House (1957, one-act play, commissioned for radio)

• Borstal Boy (1958)
• Brendan Behan's Island (1962)
• Hold Your Hour and Have Another (1963)
• Brendan Behan's New York (1964)
• Confessions of an Irish Rebel (1965)
• The Scarperer (1963)
• After The Wake: Twenty-One Prose Works Including Previously Unpublished Material (posthumous – 1981)

• Brendan Behan Sings Irish Folksongs and BalladsSpoken Arts Records SAC760 (1985)
• The Captains and the Kings

• Brendan Behan – A Life by Michael O'Sullivan
• My Brother Brendan byDominic Behan
• Brendan Behan byUlick O'Connor
• The Brothers Behan byBrian Behan
• With Brendan Behan by Peter Arthurs
• The Crazy Life of Brendan Behan: The Rise and Fall of Dublin's Laughing Boy by Frank Gray
• My Life with Brendan byBeatrice Behan
• Brendan Behan, Man and Showman by Rae Jeffs

• Petri Liukkonen."Brendan Behan".Books and Writers.
• Borstal Boy atIMDb
• Brendan Behan discography atMusicBrainz
• Two portraits from life by Irish artist Reginald Gray atArtmajeur
• Improving the Day... Tribute site, last updated in 2010.
• Brendan Behan in Paris | RTÉ Radio 1, Sep 2019Documentary on One
• "Brendan Behan Was Born 100 Years Ago Today. This Is How He Went from Jail Cell to Literary Sensation"(subscription required)—Irish Times centenary article, 9 February 2023.