MAURICE CRAIG, the distinguished architectural historian, writer and poet, who has died at the age of 91, did much to persuade Irish people that our historic buildings were of national importance and should be saved from demolition. Almost a lone voice at the time, his masterly, comprehensive and elegant book, Dublin 1660-1860: The Shaping of a City, was published in 1952. It took 13 years to sell the 2,000 copies of the first edition, by which time many buildings had been pulled down without comment or protest.
Maurice Craig was born in Belfast, the son of eye doctor and the grandson of a clock maker. He won a scholarship to Magdalene College Cambridge. His doctorate was from Trinity College Dublin. Maurice Craig wrote a number of other books such as Dublin City Churches, (1948) and Classic Irish Houses of the Middle Size.(1976) He wrote books of poetry, and one of these was titled: Cats and their Poets, (2002) which he edited as well as contributed to.
According to his step-daughter, Antonia Leslie,
[ He] lived for his books, hundreds of them adorned every square inch of every wall, of every room in his home. He read encyclopaedias like you and I read a paperback novel....Apart from a quest for knowledge and a love of the dissection of all subjects which Maurice passed on to me, he gave me a great sense of humanity. Yes, absolutely, underneath all this waffle and intellectualism, Maurice was a real humanitarian, a real softie with a huge sense of justice and fairness. He loved animals, donkeys, owls, dogs and cats especially and despite his protests to the contrary, he did love children, he just didn't know how to communicate to the very small ones, as they were too young to speak proper English or look up dictionaries...
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