Manchán's travel documentaries focus on issues of world culture and globalisation in China, the Middle East, Greenland, India, South America, Europe and Africa for RTE, TG4, the Travel Channel and History Channel. His programmes are shown in 25 territories around the world.
No Béarla, his documentary series about travelling around Ireland speaking only Irish sparked international debate.
He has written books about his travels in India, Africa and South America, in English and Irish, and 2 novels - all published by the now defunct Brandon Books
He writes the fortnightly Magan’s World travel column for the Irish Times and has written for the Guardian, LA Times and the Washington Post. He presented two series of The Big Adventureabout adventure travel for RTÉ Radio One.
His bilingual plays Broken Croí/Heart Briste and Bás Tongue (Focal Point) won a range of awards and were nominated twice for the prestigious Irish Times Theatre Awards. He’s been commissioned by the Abbey Theatre to write a play, by the BBC to write a radio play and by TG4 to write a TV drama.
Manchán lives in a self-built shack in the forest he planted in the lake wilds of Westmeath.
Focal Point is a powerful exploration of a language that might be dying and a battle of wills between two passionate people. A girl who has rediscovered her love of Irish and a cynical scholar’s son who hates his father’s pointless life (collecting vanishing words like endangered butterflies!). While giving a lecture in a language that he love-hates, to an audience that barely understands, he meets this vibrant young cailín. A fluid melding of Irish, English and surtitles - even if you don’t speak a focal this will re-engage your passion for Ireland’s mother tongue!
Directed by Mikel Murfi Written by Manchán Magan Cast includes Dónall Ó hÉalaí, Jody O'Neill Set & Costume Design by Sabine Dargent
TEAM Educational Theatre
Déanta in Éirinn (2012)
First aired Sept/Oct 2012 on TG4
A 4-part series in which Manchán sets out on a journey around Ireland seeing can he survive using only goods and materials which have been made in this country - eating only Irish food, wearing only Irish clothes, using Irish transport and enjoying only Irish entertainment.
Manchán Magan
ODDBALLS
a novel of affections
Brandon €13.99/£12.99
A richly amusing debut novel of loners and eccentrics, a kooky, deranged love story with its heart in just the right place.
Oddballs introduces us to a range of true eccentrics in a remote Irish coastal village, including a deluded coke-snorting witch, a burnt-out fisherman who dances for tourists and a boy who is fixated on freeing electricity from sockets. All are nursing past hurts and only together do they have any chance of healing.
Brandon, Oct 2010
‘Cé a Chónaigh i mo Theachsa?’ (on TG4)
Series 1 - 6 episodes, Autumn 2010 Series 2 - 12 episodes, Spring 2012 TG4
A TG4 series in which Manchán explores the hidden stories of intriguing Irish houses.
TRUCK FEVER - a journey through Africa
( Brandon, 2008)
Manchán travels overland from London to Nairobi in a truck with a group of squabbling, treacherous cast-offs of Thatcher's Britain, including privately educated schoolgirls, a predetary market gardener, a former torturer from the British Army, a locksmith claiming to be a UFO abductee, three conniving nurses and a prim quantity surveyor. A rollercoaster of adventure, anecdote and fresh observations about the nature of Africa and what it means to travel through. (For Reviews click here)
NO BÉARLA series 1 & 2
In 2007 Manchán journeyed round Ireland trying to survive through Irish alone and made the TV series No Béarla. In 2008 he made No Béarla 2 which looks more deeply at why the journey was so difficult forhim. In a humorous exploration of the Irish language, he sets out to. . . more
Previous Travel Books: ANGELS AND RABIES: A JOURNEY THROUGH THE AMERICAS (Brandon, 2006) MANCHÁN'S TRAVELS:A JOURNEY THROUGH INDIA (Brandon, 2007) A true story of deluded maharajahs, murderous environmentalists, sex-obsessed yogis, and bizarre high-society belles - stretching from women throwing themselves on funeral pyres in the deserts of Rajasthan, to mind-reading children in Himalayan forests and devious missionaries on the shores on the Ganges. Brandon
“His writing is unashamedly sensual and he has an engagingly confessional narrative voice; his adventures are as poignant as they are hair-raising.“ Sunday Telegraph
MANCHÁN SHOWREEL (2.40 minutes) Clips from Manchan Magan's programmes in Poland, China, Jordan, Canaries, Hungary, Gobi desert and various RTE studio programmes.
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