Gay Irish hurling star Cusack's book shows he's a man in every sense

Review: 'Come What May'

For most Irish people, fine weather means a quick trip to the beach or a lazy afternoon in the back garden, but for GAA (Gaelic Athletic Association) players (or more accurately, GAA lads) sunshine means championships.

If you have to ask why you’re not one of them. Donal Og Cusack, All-Ireland champion and legendary Cork hurling goalkeeper, is one of them, in more ways than one.

Born and raised in the hurling mad village of Cloyne, Co. Cork, Cusack, 32, lives in the GAA the way Buddhist monks live in their faith.

And as he makes clear himself in his remarkable new autobiography 'Come What May,' for years now the GAA has touched every part of his life; the glory, the graft, all the praise and blame are a part of the fabric that has shaped him. Many players have lined out for Cork over the decades, but few have loved the game and all that goes with it quite as much.

He has made many friends along the way. Cusack writes about characters with names as colorful as their outsize personalities, like Pa the Piper, the Bomber Roche, Bunty Cahill, Sean Og O’hAilpin and Fraggy Murphy.

He also talks about his hurly sticks with the kind of awestruck enthusiasm that Harry Potter has for his magic wands. Cusack writes the way he speaks too, in the terse English of a champion sportsman.

He’s the definition of a straight shooter. Not a word is ever wasted.

For the non-GAA fixated, his story may be a tougher draw at first. Every page is crammed with the insider jargon of hurling, and few concessions are made to the uninitiated. But for ardent GAA players it will be like looking in a mirror, because Cusack is obsessed with hurling, with its games and rituals, with competition and winning, and perhaps because of this he achieves every goal he sets himself.

But there’s far more to a captivating player than just games and trophies. For over a decade Cusack has been a national star in Ireland, but he found international fame earlier this year for something quite unexpected.

Although Cusack is in every way typical of a senior GAA All-Ireland star -- strong, capable, very sure of himself -- he’s also gay.

It’s that last part that has caused him a problem. More accurately, it’s that last part that caused some other people a problem.

A few fair weather friends started keeping their distance from him and a few enemies found a stick to beat him with. But Cusack himself, it turned out, was happy to be gay.

Although he says surprisingly little about his private life in the book, it seems appropriate to acknowledge the scale of Cusack’s courage. The gay life and the life of Cork hurlers don’t often overlap, Cusack writes, until he realizes that in him, they actually do.

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Nster.com