Status of the Irish language from 40,000 up to 80,000 people. Areas in which the language remains a vernacular are referred to as "Gaeltacht" areas. Irish is the least widely spoken among the 24 official languages of the European Union. The use of the language in the Irish diaspora has been declining steadily. Irish speakers outside the Gaeltacht include both second-language speakers and native speakers who were raised and educated through Irish. They are sometimes known as and constitute an expanding minority, though of uncertain size. They are predominantly urban dwellers. Present trends make it likely that they represent the future of the language and
The Last Day of a Condemned Man looks like to the personality of the prison priest. He does not betray his name or what he has done to the reader, though he vaguely hints that he has killed someone. On the day he is to be executed he sees his three-year-old daughter for the last time, but she no longer recognizes him, and she tells him that her father is dead. The novel ends just after he briefly but desperately begs for pardon and curses the people of his time, the people he hears outside, screaming impatiently for the spectacle of his decapitation. The book is also