Bono

Bono's mother Iris passed away when the singer was only 14 years old. He visited her in hospital after she suffered an aneurysm and thereafter, he feels that ...

It’s hard to figure that a large part of her has already left. Later adding: “Three days later Norman and I are brought into the hospital to say goodbye. We were three Irish men, and we avoided the pain that we knew would come from thinking and speaking about her.”

In an extract of his forthcoming memoir Surrender: 40 Songs, One Story published in The New Yorker, the U2 frontman recalled his mother Iris Hewson collapsing ...

The subject of the opera is the absence of a woman called Iris, and the music swells to stay the silence that envelops the house and the three men – one of whom is just a boy.” “Three men used to shouting at the television, now shouting at one another. [Terms of use,](https://www.independent.co.uk/service/user-policies-a6184151.html) [Cookie policy](https://www.independent.co.uk/service/cookie-policy-a6184186.html) and [Privacy notice.](https://www.independent.co.uk/service/privacy-policy-a6184181.html) That we rarely thought of her again,” he wrote. [Privacy policy](https://policies.google.com/privacy?hl=en) and [Terms of service](https://policies.google.com/terms?hl=en) apply. I’m 14 and strangely calm. I enter the room at war with the universe, but Iris looks peaceful. Iris has fainted.’ The voices of my aunts and cousins blow around like a breeze through leaves. Someone realises I’m here, too. “‘Iris has fainted. ‘Iris is dying. She’s had a stroke.’”

Bono is stumping for the release of Surrender: 40 Songs, One Story, a memoir that will be out in this November. The New Yorker published this excerpt.

The look on her face was the look of a beautiful woman suppressing laughter, then the look of a beautiful woman failing to suppress laughter as it took hold of her. Their marriage made it through the incident. The memory made it home. But when I dared to look back she was laughing her head off, no part of her believing in this medieval punishment. Da made it through his flesh wound. I remember, at around seven or eight, I was a boy behaving badly.

In the chapter “Iris,” from 'Surrender: 40 Songs, One Story' out on Nov. 1, U2 frontman Bono recalled how his mother's death pushed him into making music.

“Growing up in Ireland in the Seventies with my fists up (musically speaking), it was not a natural concept. He said his brother taught him how to play the guitar. “Iris wasn’t looking for those kinds of signs in me, so she didn’t see them.” Bono also didn’t have a piano at home, though remembered that he was transfixed by the instrument whenever he came across it at their church hall in Ireland. Each chapter is named after a different song by the Irish rock band, but the title itself holds just as much importance. “I have very few memories of my mother, Iris. In fact, his mother was not aware of his musical interest. She seemed surprised that I could sing, that I was musical,” Bono remembered of a time he played the Pharaoh in Andrew Lloyd Webber’s musical Joseph and the Amazing Technicolor Dreamcoat. “Ruth is outside the hospital room, wailing, with my father, whose eyes have less life in them than my mother’s. In an [excerpt](https://www.newyorker.com/magazine/2022/09/26/from-boy-to-bono) shared from his upcoming memoir [Surrender](https://www.rollingstone.com/music/music-news/bono-surrender-memoir-excerpt-1351153/), out Nov. Looking back, Bono said he got most of his musical talent from his father. Iris had collapsed at her own father’s funeral and later died at the hospital.

The U2 lead vocalist, 62, said he and his older brother Norman had very few memories of mum Iris for that reason and that it was to 'avoid the pain' over ...

He wasn't apologising, just stating these are the facts.' He was very droll, very funny but it got rough.' I feel like I wasn't there for him really in a way I should be. On adapting to an all-male household with his father and brother, Norman, Bono – real name Paul Hewson – said: 'I had a complicated relationship with Bob. You know I am sure I was hard to deal with. She has collapsed at the side of the grave as her own father is being lowered into the ground.'

U2 singer Bono has opened up about the heartbreaking experience of losing his mum at a young age and how difficult life was after her death because he and ...

She has collapsed at the side of the grave as her own father is being lowered into the ground”. We hold her hand”. She’s alive but barely…Ruth is outside the hospital room, wailing, with my father, whose eyes have less life in them than my mother’s”. We were three Irish men, and we avoided the pain that we knew would come from thinking and speaking about her”. The 62-year-old went on to tell the story of his granddad’s funeral, where his mum ‘fainted’ by her dad’s grave. The simple explanation is that, in our house, after she died she was never spoken of again”.

'We were three Irish men, and we avoided the pain that we knew would come from thinking and speaking about her...'

In the band, in my marriage, in my faith, in my life as an activist. The subject of the opera is the absence of a woman called Iris, and the music swells to stay the silence that envelops the house and the three men—one of whom is just a boy." "The only reason I wasn’t standing in the record store at 5:30 p.m. "Three men used to shouting at the television now shouting at one another. "...I spot my father carrying my mother in his arms through a crowd, like a white snooker ball scattering a triangle of colour. He describes how his mother suffered an aneurysm at the funeral of her father.