Book of Invasions

"And it felt for me like this personal church, this nature, as a place to connect, you know [...] so that the lake has this amazing holding space. [...] And I think the lake [...] as well as all the joy and the companionship I suppose, that darkness in the lake is, is cathartic. [...] no matter what your headspace is getting in, your perspective is shifted just because you’re now at this like physically different perspective, the level of the water, the level of the ducks." 

As part of the River Residencies programme, over the summer of 2021, writer and artist Nathan O’Donnell spent several weeks on the Tipperary shoreline of Lough Derg, exploring the history, ecology, and topography of this place, and gathering stories about swimming on the lake. Designer Clare Bell joined him at Terryglass, near to where the monastery in which the 12th century original manuscript, the Book of Invasions (Lebor Gabála Érenn), was produced. Here she explored the town's legacy of manuscript tradition, alongside the visual culture and landscape of the area.

The Book of Invasions, published in 2023, is a record of this process, devised in consultation with local respondents, and with the participation of a number of swimmers who provided interviews about their experience on the lake. Compiled by O’Donnell and designed and illustrated by Bell, the Book of Invasions combines elements of personal essay and modular writing with transcripts of interviews and archival sources, serving as a repository of place-names, memories, customs, and daily rituals on the edges of this body of water. The design also reflects the tradition of the working scribe, alongside the orality and polyvocality of the material. Each section of the book refers to either the names of rooms typically found in a monastery (solarium, scriptorium), or a time in the yearly calendar (computus). Bell also used this opportunity to pay visual homage and tribute to her typography tutor and mentor, Professor Phil Baines, in the design of a section of the pages entitled 'Transcriptorium'.

The colour palette (Pantone Black U, Pantone Red 032U, and Pantone 871C) drew on the vibrancy of the colours of ageing pigments in inks used in Irish manuscripts. The cover uses a digital varnish to suggest the movement of rushes at night and the invisibility of invaders as they move upstream. The cover is peat coloured—many manuscripts have been recovered from peat bogs.

The River Residencies are co-funded by the Arts Council of Ireland’s Invitation to Collaboration scheme, led by Limerick Arts Office in partnership with the Arts Offices in Cavan, Clare and Tipperary. The River Residencies were curated by Caimin Walsh and Mary Conlon at Ormston House.

Size: 135 x 210mm (thread sewn)

The paper specified is Munken Bookwove at 80gsm.

Printing: Print Media Services