In a state of Polemocracy
A History of Northern Ireland by Thomas Hennessy Gill & Macmillan 347pp, £40/ £12.99
Fine chronicle of change
Irish History: A talented young historian's view of the extraordinary metamorphosis Ireland underwent in the 20th century, writes…
Savoury morsels of Irish history
HISTORY: TOBY BARNARD reviews A History of Ireland in 250 episodes by Jonathan Bardon, Gill and Macmillan, 560pp, ¤29.99
De Valera's begrudging attitude to 'The Big Fellow'
Tim Pat Coogan replies to some assertions made recently about the historical legacy of Éamon de Valera.
Life through a century-old lens
HISTORY: TERENCE KILLEEN reviews Dublin 1911 Edited by Catriona Crowe Prism, 245pp. €20
June 16th, 1913
FROM THE ARCHIVES: Trinity Week ended on a high note in 1930 with the university regatta on the River Liffey at Islandbridge…
De Valera's 1937 Constitution successfully stood test of time
The Constitution came into force 70 years ago today
A nation talking to itself
Irish Oratory : Publishers have been periodically compiling collections of Irish speeches for some time now
Repackaging and sanitising the Rising an impossible task
It was essentially nascent fascist sentiments which drove the leaders of the 1916 Rising, writes Lord Laird.
Commemorations can be strong unifying influence
OPINION: CONCERN HAS been expressed recently that the coming decade of centenary celebrations could lead to great controversy…
Berlin diary
What did the Germans think of us? Eurozone tensions have sparked some verbal hostilities in Ireland towards Germany, and many…
The rise of the Irish high street - and the fall of a retail icon
HISTORY: Commodity Culture and Social Class in Dublin 1850-1916 By Stephanie Rains Irish Academic Press, 226pp. €39
The ABC of the Irish
REFERENCE: Dictionary of Irish Biography James McGuire and James Quinn, editors Royal Irish Academy/Cambridge University Press…
Storm in Cork killed two children in 1916
NOVEMBER 18TH, 1916: A storm with up to hurricane winds killed two children and caused a lot of damage throughout the southern…
Avant-garde in a Free State
IRISH STUDIES : Modernism, Ireland and Civil War, by Nicholas Allen, Cambridge University Press, 225pp, £50
Vibrant narrative of the labour movement from an insider devoted to the cause
BOOK OF THE DAY: No Workers’ Republic! Reflections on Labour and Ireland, 1913 – 1967 By Barry Desmond Watchword, 352pp, €20…
Notes from a contested island
HISTORY: We Declare: Landmark Documents in Ireland's History by Richard Aldous and Niamh Puirséil, Quercus, 216pp
Little did they know
British Spies and Irish Rebels: British Intelligence and Ireland, 1916-45 By Paul McMahon Boydell Brewer, 516pp
How we got from Moore to Joyce
IRISH STUDIES: THIS IMMENSELY valuable study offers an innovative, productive, and genuinely exciting investigation of the anxieties…
Remembering the Rising
In 1966, the golden jubilee of the Easter Rising, Telefís Éireann broadcast a series of 21 lectures on the history of Ireland…
The formation of a dictator
History Why do we find it so disconcerting to learn that a mass murderer such as Stalin loved gardening, music, literature, …
Rising to the challenge
History Last year's commemoration of events in 1916 has inspired a thought-provoking essay collection
The forging of the green
History: Richard English has followed up his award-winning Armed Struggle: the History of the IRA with another survey of a vast…
Commemorating the 1916 Rising
The Defence Forces will march past the GPO on O'Connell Street in Dublin tomorrow in the first military parade commemorating …
Sense and separatism
Irish Studies: 'Ireland may be a separatist issue", observes David Pierce in his introduction, "but it is almost impossible …
The views of a public intellectual
Literary Criticism: The publication of The Irish Writer and the World, a collection of essays that first appeared between 1979…
Enduring icon of Irish socialism
Biography The enduring power of James Connolly's reputation is a phenomenon in itself
A very different take on the life and legacy of 'Dev'
Family memoirs or studies can shed valuable light on important historical figures
Georgia on his mind A convincing account of how Stalin's childhood influenced his psychology
Biography/Stalin: A Biography By Robert: On my sideboard, I have mounted a permanent exhibition of political kitsch which includes…
When history and humanity coalesce
Interview: Diarmaid Ferriter may not be speaking literally when he says that what pleased him most, as he read back through …
Agreement and disagreement
Politics: Richard Bourke, a young Irish academic at London University, has written a thoughtful and scholarly work
The view from the inside Irish History
IRISH HISTORY: British intelligence was understandably disparaging in 1922
The Catholics of Ulster by Marianne Elliott (Penguin, £9.99 in UK)
Those whose notions of the Irish past have been gleaned from ballad, song and An Phoblacht, those for whom "revisionism" is just…
The quiet man and the big fellow
Eighty years ago, the paths of two men - one who made films, the other who made history - crossed on a turbulent boat journey…
Learned and loony, bitter and blissful
One of the joyful results of writing any book on Irish history is that it puts one in touch with a cross-section of the learned…
Sketching the bigger picture
One of my students at Liverpool University once told me that he thought Irish history (or more accurately Irish historiography…
Reinventing Ireland
The publisher informs us that this book is part of a new series of Essential Histories, national histories that are designed …
A long way from Rome
`Comfortable recollections of Catholics and Dissenters fighting side by side for liberty in 1798 have been severely corroded …
`An astounding arrogance and contempt for almost all of the most prominent scholars of modern Ireland'
Ireland and Empire sets out to investigate "the ways in which the languages of imperialism, colonialism, post-coloniality and…
The livin and the dead
At the start of the first episode of Seven Ages, Sean O Mordha's epic television history of the State, we hear, over images of…
Fresh insights into turbulent years
This is an important and challenging book on an area of Irish history which, surprisingly, has remained very much under-studied…
An Irishman's Diary
Ah yes, this time of year again; and no, it is not merely a disorder of mine, this interest in the Irish role in two world wars…
The Oxford Companion to Irish History, ed. S.J. Connolly (OUP, £12.99 in UK)
Surely an essential reference book, which seems to cover everything and everyone from St Patrick (yes, he did exist) down to …
An Irishman's Diary
It is time to move on to other subjects, other narratives; but let me conclude the prevailing narrative of recent weeks - remembrance…
Revolutionaries turned politicians: a painful, confusing metamorphosis
Revolutions are ex pensive things, even modest ones like the little revolution which resulted in Irish independence three-quarters…
Term of political abuse or a badge of honour
The Blueshirts And Irish Politics, by Mike Cronin, Four Courts Press, hardback 220pp £19.95
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