Juanita Casey:Juanita Casey, writer, poet, artist and horse breeder, has died aged 87 in Okehampton, Devon. But it was Ireland that inspired much of her best-known work.
Casey’s writing won her fans in Ireland, the US and in England. Her best-known novel, The Horse of Selene (Dolmen 1971), exploring the emergence of the freedom of spirit which characterised the late 1960s, secured her a cult following, particularly in Ireland and the US.
Born in 1925 and adopted as Joy Barlow (renamed Juanita by her uncle after his favourite circus lion), she was brought up in Southampton.
Despite the otherwise respectable surroundings, her uncle – a flamboyant enigmatic personality who had connections with circus and Romany folk – instilled in Casey, with little persuasion, a sense of the fantastic and imaginary.
In his company she made her first visit to Ireland on a quest for the Batty pedigree of horses to train them for a Liberty routine; her passion for everything equine remained throughout her life as a well-respected breeder and handler.
Casey’s “comet-like progress through life” as she once put it, included three marriages. The first, at just 16, was to John “Crusoe” Fisher, who farmed a large estate in Mappowder, Dorset, where she met and became friends with writer Theodore Powys and his family.
After the war, in a spontaneous decision, they sold the farm and sailed in a number of vessels. Their son William was born in 1947. Soon after, while moored in Penzance where she was selling her drawings of horses in Newlyn, she was introduced to the St Ives artist Sven Berlin.
Casey and Berlin were married in 1953 and soon after they left Cornwall and travelled by gypsy caravan to the New Forest. Settling in Home Farm in Emery Down she indulged her love of horse breeding. At the same time she was aiming to produce a zorse – a hybrid of horse and zebra (the latter she would ride around led by the Irish groom, journalist Fergus Casey).
By 1962, the marriage to Berlin had ended and they were divorced in 1963, Casey having left with Fergus Casey and begun a new chapter in her life in Ireland. It was here that she concentrated on writing, working with Phoenix House on Hath the Rain a Father and the legendary Dolmen Press, even producing a short-lived newspaper while living in Drogheda.
Tragically, Fergus Casey, while on assignment, was found drowned in Galway and Casey and their daughter Sheba were taken care of by Vincent and Margaret Jones who were living in the former home of playwright JM Synge.
But eventually they had to fend for themselves, moving to Sneem in Co Kerry where she worked in the pottery and continued to write. With three books already published she was welcomed as a literary figure at the prestigious Listowel Writers’ Week, where she was introduced by actor and director Vincent Dowling.
Dowling also introduced her to the Abbey Theatre where she took to the stage to read a poem in aid of Irish Travellers. In 1974 Casey and her daughter returned to the UK and settled in Okehampton, Devon. Shortly after, Juanita joined Roberts Circus as horsemaster.
A remarkable wordsmith, her work will endure as a literary experience to be treasured. She is survived by two sons, Will and Jasper, and her daughter, Sheba.
Juanita Casey. Born October 10th, 1925, Died October 24th, 2012