Well-known Irish readers pay tribute to the books that changed their lives

In Dear Farenheit 541, librarian, Annie Spence, has crafted love letters and breakup notes to the books that have thrilled and disappointed her. We asked three of Ireland’s most prolific readers to write a letter to the books that changed their lives, and their words will delight you.

Rick O’Shea, broadcaster

Rick O’Shea has 13,000 members in his online book club and is a voracious reader. He says that all of the building blocks of his spiritual belief system came together while reading The God Delusion, by Richard Dawkins, and resulted in him embracing atheism.

Dear Richard Dawkins and The God Delusion, I, like most of us in Ireland, was brought up Catholic. I went to a Christian Brothers school and went through all the religious box-ticking that involves. Once I became a teenager, I started to question even the most basic tenets of the Church, so that by the time I hit college, I was agnostic. I think that a lot of us like to cling to the idea of God in a bubble, away from the whole ‘organised religion’ thing, so that if anything bad happens to us, we can throw up a few prayers, in the hope that it will make everything better. It doesn’t.

I got married for the second time in 2012 and I brought a few books with me on honeymoon, one of which was you. I had started reading you in Dublin, and by the time we reached San Francisco, I was sure I was a card-carrying atheist (don’t let people tell you we don’t have membership cards; we have!). I was always teetering on the edge, but The God Delusion was the last tip I needed.

Dawkins says that you don’t have to prove that God doesn’t exist; other people must prove that he does. That’s how science works. I’ve had a strong amateur interest in science for my whole life and I believe in the scientific method: that if you believe something to be fact, you must prove that it is. Putting this test to religion puts it on very shaky ground, and why should we base our entire lives on something unprovable?

I was nine-tenths of the way over the edge, but, thanks to you, I know that you don’t have to have religion in order to give me a moral compass. I don’t have to believe that a magic man in the sky is going to strike me down with a lightning bolt, if I do something wrong; I can believe in the good in people, instead.

Thank you, Rick O’Shea

Patricia Scanlan

Bestselling author, Patricia Scanlan, could have coined the phrase ‘chick lit’. Her first book was published 27 years ago, and, since then, millions have sold nationwide. She first read The Game of Life And How To Play It when she was in her early twenties, before she was a published writer, and says that it transformed the way she approached life.

Dear Florence, and The Game of Life, you will never know how much of a difference your powerful, and life-changing, knowledge enhanced my life. It’s my pleasure to introduce new readers to you both.

The Game of Life, by Florence Scovel-Shinn, came into my life when I was having a very difficult time. When I read it, and started putting into practice the teachings the author espoused, I became empowered to make choices about the way I reacted to events in my life.

Florence was a teacher of metaphysics and she taught that life is not a battle, but a game, and that what we put out in life comes back to us. Whether it is positive or negative is entirely up to ourselves, and the way we think and act.

There are certain spiritual laws — the laws of the universe — governing our existence on the earthly plane.

When we know them, we can change our lives for the better. She explains how our thoughts and words affect the experience we have, and uses examples to show how we can use our thoughts and words to bring more of what we want to us, including abundance, love, and success.

She explains the power of ‘The Word,’ the law of non-resistance, the law of karma and forgiveness, and how to cast the burden, and find love, all by the ‘law of attraction.’ If we give out positivity, we will get it back. If we give out love, we will attract it back to us, and so on. It’s a very simple book, containing profound truths. (A later, bestselling book, The Secret, followed the same principles.) I would highly recommend The Game of Life and wish you the joy of reading and putting into practice the teachings that will change your life for the better.

Warmest wishes, Patricia Scanlan

Orange Blossom Days, by Patricia Scanlan, is published in paperback on February 22.

David Norris, senator, scholar, and civil rights activist

David Norris adores the written word. He may be a committed Joycean, but when he requires comfort from language, he looks to his faith. He says that The Book Of Common Prayer (the prayer book of the Anglican church) is an ever-present comfort to him, providing both language of beauty, and of wisdom.

Dear The Book of Common Prayer, I come back to you in times of good and times of bad. I know Joyce off by heart, so I can recite him to myself whenever I feel like it.

I have screeds and screeds of it in my head that I can lift out when I need it.

The language in the Book of Common Prayer is so absolutely beautiful, and the services are so beautifully laid out. I think of the prayer, ‘Oh God, who art the author of peace and lover of concord, in knowledge of whom standeth our eternal life,’ and think to myself, ‘how could you possibly better that?’

I think you are absolutely lovely. The rhythm and the delicacy, and the beauty of the language in the book, soothe me. I love the line, ‘Oh God, who has brought us safely to the beginning of this day’; it really is such wonderful stuff.

During the Presidential election in 2011, I was given such an awful time. The media turned on me and there was scarcely a newspaper or radio or television station in the country that didn’t batter me with the most unspeakable lies. It was horrendous, and absolute misery.

What kept me going, during this time, was my religious faith and reading these beautiful phrases, which seemed to speak directly to me.

You are such an interesting historical document. We have, thankfully, moved on from the period of Archbishop Cranmer, because there is quite a lot of nasty stuff about the Church of Rome in the book.

At the time, they were in a real fight and they were making the distinction between the two.

There are all kinds of old traditions, which, of course, today, there are very divided opinions about, such as the churching of women. This was a service to give thanks for a safe delivery and to cleanse the woman after childbirth.

Nowadays, people would think this is a horrible idea.

I have Joyce in my head and my heart, but you are the one I go back to, time and time again.

Thank you. Thank you very much.

Congratulations on the beauty and serenity of the language you created in this book.

David Norris