Uachtarán na hÉireann, President Michael D. Higgins unveiled a plaque in Rahoon Cemetery, Galway, to mark the connection of the grave of Michael ‘Sonny’ Bodkin with James Joyce, Nora Barnacle and the ‘The Dead’, which the President has said is one of the greatest short stories of all time.

The ‘lonely churchyard where Michael Furey lay buried’, which forms the climax of ‘The Dead’, is the final resting place of the character Gretta Conroy’s late young lover Michael Furey.

Joyce partly based the fictional character of Michael Furey on the real Michael ‘Sonny’ Bodkin, who had an earlier relationship with Nora Barnacle and died at the age of 20 from tuberculosis. Michael Bodkin’s grave is in the Bodkin Family Vault in Rahoon Cemetery.

This year is the 110th anniversary of the publication of ‘The Dead’ within James Joyce’s acclaimed collection ‘Dubliners’, with today’s event taking place on the 83rd anniversary of Joyce’s death, on 13 January 1941 in Zurich.

The plaque has been commissioned by Galway City Council and was unveiled by the President at the Bodkin Family Vault in a ceremony attended by Michael Bodkin’s grandniece Mrs Mary O’Connor and her family. Singer Noel O’Grady sang ‘The Lass of Aughrim’, which plays a central role in events in ‘The Dead’, as part of the ceremony.