Sinéad O'Connor Childhood — Glenageary, County Dublin

Sinéad O'Connor grew up in Glenageary, a suburb of Dún Laoghaire on Dublin's south coast, in a household she later described as severely abusive. Her mother Marie was violent and controlling; her parents divorced when Sinéad was eight, and she shuttled between her mother and father in circumstances of significant instability. At thirteen she was sent to a Magdalene laundry — a church-run institution for 'wayward' girls — where she was given guitar lessons. The guitar became her way out.

O'Connor's debut The Lion and the Cobra (1987) announced an artist of remarkable originality — her shaved head, her uncompromising politics, and her voice, which could move from near-whisper to shattering intensity within a single phrase, made her unlike anything else in pop. 'Nothing Compares 2 U' (1990), written by Prince, became one of the best-selling singles in history and its video — her face filling the frame, a single tear — was one of the defining images of the decade. Her subsequent career was a sustained refusal to be what the industry wanted her to be.

Glenageary is a comfortable south Dublin suburb overlooking Dublin Bay. O'Connor lived in various parts of Dublin and Ireland throughout her life and had a complex, often painful relationship with her country and its institutions — particularly the Catholic Church, whose authority she challenged at great personal cost. She converted to Islam in 2018, taking the name Shuhada' Sadaqat. She died in London on July 26, 2023, at the age of 56.