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Ross O'Carroll-Kelly
Statue of Ross O'Carroll-Kelly, Easons Headquarters, O'Connell Street, Dublin
First appearance	Sunday Tribune column, January 1998
Created by	Paul Howard
Genre	Humour
Publisher	Sunday Tribune, The O'Brien Press, Penguin Books, The Irish Times
Media type	paperback, audiobook, newspaper column, stage play
In-universe information
Gender	Male
Occupation	Student, estate agent, rugby coach, reality TV star, biomedical waste disposal, mobile paper shredder operator
Family	List of Ross O'Carroll-Kelly characters
Spouse	Sorcha Eidemar Françoise O'Carroll-Kelly (née Lalor)
Children	Ronan Masters, Honor O'Carroll-Kelly, Brian O'Carroll-Kelly, Jonathan O'Carroll-Kelly, Leo O'Carroll-Kelly
Relatives	Charles O'Carroll-Kelly (father) Fionnuala O'Carroll-Kelly (mother) Erika Joseph (half-sister) Rihanna-Brogan Masters (granddaughter)
Religion	Lapsed Catholic
Nationality	Irish

Ross O'Carroll-Kelly is a satirical fictional Irish character, a wealthy South County Dublin rugby union jock created by journalist Paul Howard. The character first appeared in a January 1998 column in the Sunday Tribune newspaper and later transferred to The Irish Times. The series comprises twenty-one novels, three plays, a CD, two other books, a weekly podcast, and the newspaper column, as of 2023.

Works in the series

Language

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The novels are written entirely from Ross's first-person perspective, written in an eye dialect representative of the intonation attributed to affluent areas of South Dublin, commonly called "Dortspeak" (after the DART, a rail service covering the Dublin coast). This accent is one of the primary targets of satire in the columns and novels. Due to the wide variety of esoteric slang used in the novels, a glossary ("ThesauRoss") appears as an appendix to Ross O'Carroll-Kelly's Guide to (South) Dublin: How To Get By On, Like, €10,000 A Day. Though the basic idioms are derived largely from standard Hiberno-English, the South Dublin accent as represented by Howard has distinctive features:

• "Car" is written as "cor", "Arts" as "Orts", "star" as "stor", "fuck" as "fock", and "right" as "roysh".
• The "aspirated T" or "soft T" prevails: "right" becomes "roysh", "DART" becomes "Dorsh".
• A form of rhyming slang is used: A taxi is a "Jo Maxi" (or simply a "Jo"), a face is a "boat race", breasts are "top tens" (Top Ten hits – tits) and a love-bite is a "Denis" (Denis Hickie). Ross often refers to having an "Allied Irish" (Allied Irish Banks: "wank"). "Padraig Pearse", "fierce".
• Other forms of wordplay (occasionally employing equally obscure references) are also common. For example, a girl who has "fallen to the communists", has "Munster playing at home" or has won a "starring role in a period costume drama" is (or is speculated to be) having her period.
• Ross, in particular, describes women by comparing them to female celebrities. For example, "A total Ali Landry", "A bit of a girl-next-door vibe, if your next door neighbour happens to be Cheryl Tweedy".
• Ugly women are often referred to as "moonpigs" or "swamp donkeys".

Although the main satirical targets of the columns are affluent South Dublin dwellers, elements of working-class culture (sometimes called skanger culture) are also parodied, again, primarily through language.

• Common exclamations include "Ah Jaysus!", and "(Wat's de) Story, bud?" (meaning "How are you?").
• The 'th' sound becomes a 'd' sound: "Wudja looka dat young fella over dare" ("Would you look at that young man over there").
• "The Herald" becomes "De Heddild", "aren't" becomes "arden't", and crime figure "The General" becomes "de Generodle".
• Working-class people are sometimes referred to by Ross as "Howiyas" (based on the Dublin accent rendering of "How are you?"), and the women as "Jacintas", "Anitas" (pronounced as Anee-eh) or "Natalies" (names perceived to be common among working class Dublin women).
• The term "steamer" is a phrase used by Ross referring to a guy who "bats for the other team" or "drives on the wrong side of the road" i.e.: is homosexual.

Eye dialect is also used to portray the accents of people from Northern Ireland, "culchies" (rural people), and foreigners.

Characters

Cultural impact

Ross O'Carroll-Kelly was something of a craze in Ireland, and his name has become a byword for all that is perceived to be wrong in Celtic Tiger Ireland. Though it is largely viewed as satire, there are those who view Ross O'Carroll-Kelly as a role model or an idol. Paul Howard has claimed some people have imitated Ross's friends pastime of driving through disadvantaged areas in expensive cars, shouting "Affluence!" at passers-by and throwing €5 notes out the window. Following Ross's move to The Irish Times, the Irish Independent began a similar column, OMG! featuring a female counterpart to Ross, in its Weekend supplement on 22 September 2007.

References

1. Interview with Paul Howard, Robert Ryan, Oxygen.ie, retrieved 18 January 2010
2. ^ Spawning a bundle of 'Rosser' wannabes, top snob takes to stage, Irish Independent, 31 August 2007, retrieved 9 April 2009
3. Ross O'Carroll-Kelly - Books - Keeping Up with the Kalashnikovs Archived 27 November 2013 at the Wayback Machine
4. Ross O'Carroll-Kelly - Home
5. Ross O'Carroll-Kelly (27 September 2010). The Oh My God Delusion. Penguin. ISBN 978-1844881758.
6. Archived 14 September 2010 at the Wayback Machine
7. "ROSS O'CARROLL KELLY 'BREAKING DAD'- MUST END THIS SAT 24th". The Gaiety Theatre - Irish Theatre in Dublin. Retrieved 4 August 2014.
8. "Ross O'Carroll Kelly Postcards from the Ledge set for Gaiety Theatre run". 3 July 2017.
9. "Man Friday, Roysh!". RTÉ One. 2 November 2007. Retrieved 24 October 2010.
10. "OMG! The weekly diary of Cathy, a southside Yummy Drummie". Irish Independent. 3 November 2007. Retrieved 5 February 2017.

External links

• Official site

• Ross O'Carroll-Kelly
• Characters in novels of the 20th century
• Characters in novels of the 21st century
• Literary characters introduced in 1998
• Fictional Irish people
• Novel series
• Irish satirical novels
• Characters in Irish novels
• Fictional real estate agents
• Male characters in literature
• Comedy literature characters