Ireland: the politics of enmity 1789–2006 Paul Bew (Oxford University Press, £35) ISBN 9780198205555 According to the preface, this book ‘is about the conflict between the Protestant British—both on the British “mainland” and in Ireland itself—and the Catholic Irish’, from the 1800 Act of Union to the 2006 St Andrews Agreement. The various attempts by … Read more
In the first wave of independence during the late 1950s and early 1960s, most sub-Saharan African states were expected to follow the modernising road, both by the departing colonial administrators and by the incoming African rulers. Africans would build legal-rational states underpinned by a newly emerging African nationalism. Modernity offered sub-Saharan Africa the chance to … Read more
Happy birthday, Italy! Or maybe not. Italy officially celebrates 150 years of unification but it seems that not everyone is happy. Yes, it’s those Northerners causing trouble again. The Northern League protests that the hard-working, industrialised part of the country (sound familiar?) is carrying the backward, rural south on its shoulders. To make matters worse, … Read more
We have an ordinary index card, 6in. by 4in., brown and fragile with age; a rough photograph, cropped from something larger; a description, not very accurate; and a typed legend of remarks, intended, perhaps, to be helpful but of questionable value. The card was found in an old book, a 1926 edition of Michael Collins … Read more
On 20 September 1845, The Nation advertised: ‘Frederick Douglas [sic], recently a slave in the United States, intends to deliver another lecture in the Music-Hall, Lower-Abbey street, on Tuesday evening next, 23rd instant, at eight o’clock. Doors to be open at half-past seven o’clock. Admission, by tickets, to be had at the door. Promenade—fourpence. Gallery—twopence.’ … Read more