Nick Maxwell Born in Kerry, Bernard Connor received his early education in Ardfert and went to university in France, first in Montpelier and then Rheims, graduating there as a doctor of physic in 1693. He travelled widely in his short career. After a brief period practising medicine in Paris, he set out to accompany the sons of … Read more
The history of cricket in County Kilkenny—the forgotten game Michael O’Dwyer (O’Dwyer Books, ‘Garvaghey’, College Gardens, Kilkenny, e35 + e7 p&p) Michael O’Dwyer’s book is correctly subtitled ‘the forgotten game’. Whatever else we may think of when we think of Kilkenny, cricket hardly leaps to mind. And yet this book, drawing on the ample documentation … Read more
In February 1948 Éamonn de Valera and his party lost power after sixteen years in government. A few years earlier he had looked unassailable, and was admired for his calmness and statesmanship during the Emergency. Now the opposition parties rallied behind the slogan ‘Put them out!’, and the electorate did their bidding. The ensuing excitement … Read more
Improbable Frequency Dublin Theatre Festival, 27 Sept.–9 Oct. 2004 Rough Magic Theatre Company by Eamon O’Flaherty History-related TV over the last quarter has been a bit disappointing. RTÉ’s main contribution was a pair of half-hour programmes in the ‘Townlands’ series that, while informative and entertaining, hardly stretched the medium: ‘Not Fade Away’, a mildly … Read more
During the Irish revolution, the creation of the physical-force tradition necessitated the humiliation of constitutional nationalists by their social inferiors in Sinn Féin and the Volunteers. The resentment generated by the destruction of the parliamentary tradition led to violent feuding between republicans and nationalists in County Galway between 1914 and 1918. While the much less … Read more