Sign up to The Irish Times Archive (1859 - 2008)My Account »

Sat 11 Nov 2002The last of the rivals in a brotherly competitivenessBRIAN BEHAN: Brian Behan, who died last week aged 75, was like his brothers, Brendan and Dominic, a writer of some distinction.He spent most of his life in England where before he turned to writing he was a hod-carrier, a communist and trade-union militant whose activities twice led to imprisonment in the 1950s. He was also a college lecturer and, late in life, took to nude swimming.