I interviewed Limerick based author Seosamh Ó Cuinneagáin. Though long settled in Limerick, Ó Cuinneagáin’s journey began in Co. Kilkenny, rooted in childhood stories told by Paddy Stapleton, a veteran of the Somme. Stapleton’s tales of German precision planted the seed of a lifelong obsession. Decades later, that curiosity manifested in twenty consecutive summers spent in Berlin—a chapter of his life defined by a striking contrast: tending to a cemetery by day, and untangling the complexities of advanced linguistics by night.
We spoke about his time in Germany, particularly in Berlin, where he secured work in a cemetery through a German priest he had met in Waterford. He also worked as a translator and on construction sites, where he discovered that some of his fellow workers had served in the SS during World War II.
Berlin Divided offers a vivid, firsthand account of a city fractured by the Cold War. Ó Cuinneagáin captures everything from the palpable tension of crossing into the Soviet sector to candid conversations with former Wehrmacht officers, revealing the human realities behind Europe’s divided past. Drawing on lived experience, deep scholarship, and rare personal encounters, he brings the atmosphere and anxieties of Cold War Berlin into sharp focus.
The book can be ordered directly from Ó Cuinneagáin, via email: seosamhocuinneagain@yahoo.ie
The interview will also be broadcast on Limerick City Community Radio on Sunday June 7 between 12 and 12.45 PM
sources
https://irishinterest.ie/author/seosamh-o-cuinneagain/100024
History of Sorts 
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