David Norris
A Joyce scholar took his own country to court – and in 1988 brought down the law under which Oscar Wilde had once been convicted.
David Norris was born in the Belgian Congo, where his father worked as an engineer. After his father’s death he grew up with his mother’s family in Dublin. He studied English at Trinity College Dublin and taught there for almost thirty years. He became known as a passionate expert on James Joyce and helped make Dublin’s annual Bloomsday celebration popular.
In the 1970s Norris was one of the founders of the Irish gay rights movement. In 1977 he went to court against two laws dating from British rule that made sex between men a crime – the same laws under which Oscar Wilde had been convicted. He lost in the High Court and in 1983, by three votes to two, in the Supreme Court, whose Chief Justice pointed to the “Christian character” of the state. His lawyer was Mary Robinson, later President of Ireland.
Norris took the case to the European Court of Human Rights. On 26 October 1988 it ruled by eight votes to six that Ireland’s ban violated the right to private life. Five more years of pressure followed until the Irish parliament repealed the law in 1993; it was signed by President Mary Robinson.
In 1987 Norris was elected to the Irish Senate, the first openly gay person elected to public office in Ireland. He served there until 2024, longer than any other senator. In 2011 he stood for President of Ireland.