Dublin University Fabian Society
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Until 1952, the University Committees and Society's Committee would not approve overtly-political groups in College. The argument was the Hist and Phil were adequate forums for debate. Because of the Catholic hierarchy's ban[1] on Catholics attending TCD, until the end of the 1960s the student body was heavily weighted with students from the Great Britain and Northern Ireland: this meant there was little involvement in local political parties.
The name of the Dublin University Fabian Society was finally accepted, after the College authorities vetoed more explicit alternatives (such as the Promethean Society and the Spartacus Society), and the Fabians were allocated a committee and meeting room on the first floor of number 4, Trinity College. The Society owed little more than a name to its London antecedent[2], instead providing an umbrella for a wide range of leftist views.
The Society became more overtly activist in the early 1960s, when it was dominated by a group which included Bob Mitchell (an affiliate of Noel Browne), Sean Edwards (Marxist son of Frank Edwards[3], the Secretary of the Irish-Soviet Friendship Society) and John Darley (a member of the British Labour Party and British Parliamentary candidate). These shared little in ideology, except espousing socialist alternatives to the Irish orthodoxy, affiliation with CND and opposed to Irish membership of the European Common Market. In 1965, Bob Mitchell (working with Michael O'Leary[4])was largely instrumental in setting-up a Universities Branch of the Irish Labour Party. Mitchell also made overtures to the Queen's University, Belfast, Labour Group to form an Irish Association of Labour Student Organisations, which would be an innovation in cross-border politics. Despite a foundation meeting in Dublin, little transpired, and the QUB contingent were soon involved in People's Democracy.
Early membership also included Sean Edwards (member of the Irish Workers Party and son of Frank Edwards), John Darley (who, as John Whysall was twice a candidate for the Labour Party in British General Elections), Rayner Lysaght (who publishes under the name of D.R.O'Conor Lysaght) and Paul Gillespie (later foreign editor of The Irish Times).
[edit] Malcolm Redfellow
This nom-de-plume was adopted, about 1964-65, by members of Dublin University Fabian Society, for political and social comment, in undergraduate and mainstream publications. The Dublin University Fabian Society was the only political society approved by the College authorities at that time, and embraced a wide range of political viewpoints. The two main writers were Bob Mitchell and John Darley, both members of the Irish Labour Party.
"Malcolm Redfellow" began as a pale imitation of a character, the Rt Hon Christopher Smooth, in Michael Frayn's regular column in The Observer: "The Rt Hon Christopher Smooth, Minister for Public Concern, expressed public concern". Soon Malcolm Redfellow developed a personality of his own, as a young, abrasive, left-wing politician on the make.
In later years, letters appeared in the British Press and on the Have Your Say section of the BBC News web-site using this name.
In August 2006 a blog, largely of extended essays on politics and literature, with an Irish focus, Malcolm Redfellow revivus, consciously employed an older, cynical version of the persona. This has now developed into "Malcolm Redfellow's Home Service" and "Malcolm Redfellow's World Service".
