Camden Community Radio

April 24th is the official one hundredth anniversary of the Easter Rising in Ireland. Commemorations are already underway to mark the week hundreds of people, mostly in Dublin, rose up to fight against British rule. After six days the struggle ended in an unconditional surrender. The seven men who planned the revolt were executed. But knowing that might be their fate they’d already chosen someone to carry on their work: Kathleen Clarke was the wife of one of their number, Thomas Clarke.

She was under strict instructions to stay home, guard the secrets, look out for the welfare of the fighters’ families and keep the flame burning.

What Kathleen endured during those days has been dramatised by Irish actress Sharon Sexton. She’s performing her one woman play “A Fit Wife for a Revolutionary” at the London Irish Centre in Camden Square from the 29th of March until the 2nd of April.

Sharon has appeared in London in The Commitments and is currently in Billy Elliott. She’s hoping to take her play around Britain and to Ireland later in the year. Sharon was keen to look at the role taken by women in the Rising, which has often been overlooked. She originally planned to follow a number of stories but as her research progressed she found there was just so much to say about Kathleen Clarke’s life that she had to focus on her. Catherine Carroll asked Sharon to describe the subject of her play.

Package by Catherine Carroll

A Fit Wife for a Revolutionary

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