Nick Maxwell Ray Gillespie’s Seventeenth century Ireland: making Ireland modern (Gill and Macmillan, 348pp, ?18.99/£14.99, ISBN 0717139468) is the penultimate of the six-part New Gill History of Ireland series (only Ian McBride’s much-awaited Eighteenth century Ireland: ascendancy and dispossession remains to be published; the other four books were featured in Bookworm’s Nov./Dec. 2005 offering). While most surveys … Read more
The War of the World: History’s Age of Hatred Niall Ferguson (Allen Lane, £25) ISBN 9780713997088This book is a tremendous read, thoroughly researched and presented in a style easily followed. Despite often sickening subject-matter, the author holds the reader’s attention. Yet the text raises serious questions that it never answers. It gives facts that do … Read more
Soldiers and chiefs, the Irish at war National Museum of Ireland Collins Barracks, Dublin Tues.–Sat. 10am–5pm, Sun. 2pm–5pm (closed Mon.) by Tony Canavan This is an ambitious exhibition that undertakes to present the history of the Irish at war from 1550. It is suitably located in Collins Barracks, where it occupies 1,700 square metres of … Read more
The earldom of Desmond, 1463–1583: the decline and crisis of a feudal lordship Anthony M. McCormack (Four Courts Press, ?45) ISBN 1851828826 The Gaelic lordship of the O’Sullivan Beare Colin Breen (Four Courts Press, ?45) ISBN 1851829555 Labourers in various fields of endeavour periodically feel called upon to sketch out agendas of desiderata. Historians are … Read more
Trials of Irish history: genesis and evolution of a reappraisal, 1938–2000 Evi Gkotzaridis (Routledge, £75) ISBN 0415329183 This is the oddest yet most engaging examination so far of the so-called ‘revisionist school’ of Irish historians, whose precepts, motives and performance have been subjected to an often rancorous but largely sterile debate over the past two … Read more