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Rayner Lysaght died after a prolonged illness on July 2 in Beaumont Hospital, Dublin, at the age of 80. He was a prominent activist and historian in the Irish labour movement and an intellectual forebear in many ways of the current array of far-left parties and elected politicians.
His full name, which he preferred to use in his writings, was Daniel Rayner O'Connor Lysaght. He was born on January 30, 1941, in Llanishen, Cardiff, the eldest son of surgeon Arthur and Jacqueline Lysaght (née Heard).
The family had roots in Limerick and Cork and used the spelling "Conner" in their name, but Rayner preferred "O'Connor", based on his admiration for Feargus O'Connor (1796-1855), an Irish-born leader of the radical Chartist movement for political reform in Britain.
Lysaght received his secondary education at Cheltenham College before moving to Trinity College Dublin, where he studied modern history and political science, graduating in 1964 with an honours BA. He later obtained a master's degree at University College Dublin in 1983.
An admirer of the innovative and controversial politician Dr Noel Browne, Rayner joined the left-wing National Progressive Democrats (NPD). The party, established by Browne and Roscommon TD Jack Mc- Quillan, was active from 1958 to 1963.
Browne and McQuillan went on to join the Labour Party and Lysaght followed. Browne, though, was not easy to get along with and he eventually drove Rayner out of the party.
In the mid-1960s Rayner became involved with the far-left current of the labour movement which adhered to the views of Leon Trotsky and worked toward starting a revolution that would establish a socialist society based on democratic principles rather than a Stalinist dictatorship. The Vietnam War was a huge issue at the time and the protests against it facilitated the spread of radical ideas.
In 1967 he joined the Irish Workers'...