The Slug and the Snail
Oein DeBhairduin’s tale, rooted in the oral tradition of the Irish Traveller community, is about identity and different ways of seeing the world. Two slugs travel happily together until a crow asks them where their home is. The younger brother, embarrassed, makes himself a shell, and calls himself snail. The older brother carries on as he is. At first, the brothers grow apart. But in time, they learn to respect each other’s way of life.
Oein DeBhairduin
Oein DeBhairduin is a writer, activist and educator with a passion for preserving the beauty of Traveller tales, sayings, retellings and historic exchanges. Oein is the author of the award-winning Why the moon travels. His other works are Weave, The Slug and the Snail and Twiggy Woman. He is the Traveller Culture Collections Development Officer with the National Museum of Ireland and seeks to pair community activism with cultural celebration, recalling old tales with fresh modern connections and, most of all, he wishes to rekindle the hearth fires of a shared kinship.
