A New History of Ireland, vol. 1 Prehistoric and early Ireland Dáibhí Ó Cróinín (ed.) (Oxford University Press, €187.40) ISBN 0-19-821737-4Reviewing a book that weighs in at more than 1200 pages and carrying it from office to home reminded me of that North American game of social responsibility in which teenagers are asked to carry … Read more
As the Scottish comedian Arnold Browne used to say, the secret of good comedy is timing: the audience and the comedian must show up at the same time. Being even one day out made a difference, he observed. Not so where historical journals are concerned, it seems. Thus the May 2004 issue of Irish Historical … Read more
Hitler’s Irishman; the story of Lord Haw-Haw RTÉ 1 Written and directed by Martin Gilbert By Eamon O’Flaherty Ireland’s flirtation with Fascism and Nazism took many forms in the period between the rise of Mussolini and the end of the Second World War. There was considerable admiration for Italian Fascism in both Britain and Ireland … Read more
Ireland and the Palestine question 1948–2004 Rory Miller (Irish Academic Press) €45 hardback ISBN 07165 28142 €25 paperback ISBN 07165 33499Rory Miller begins his story not in 1948 but in 1937, when Eamonn de Valera told the League of Nations that the Palestine question should not be solved by partition, ‘the cruelest wrong that could … Read more
Radical politics in modern Ireland: the Irish Socialist Republican Party, 1896–1904 David Lynch (Irish Academic Press, €39.50) ISBN 0716533561Written by a member of the Trotskyist Socialist Workers’ Party (SWP), this book belongs to a sub-genre of labour history that sees history-writing as instrumental and is at pains to draw lessons regarding present-day socialist politics and … Read more