THE IRISH TO THE RESCUE: THE TERCENTENARY OF THE POLISH PRINCESS CLEMENTINA’S ESCAPE

RICHARD K. MAHER (ed.) Peter Lang £30 ISBN 9781789979343 Reviewed by Tony Canavan Tony Canavan is Consultant Editor of Books Ireland. While the title of this book may be eye-catching, it does not do justice to the breadth and depth of the essays it contains. Based on a seminar held in 2019 to commemorate the … Read more

Cromwell and Ireland: new perspectives

MARTYN BENNETT, RAY GILLESPIE and R. SCOTT SPURLOCK (eds) Liverpool University Press £90 ISBN 9781789622379 Reviewed by Micheál Ó Siochrú To this day, Cromwell retains his status as one of Ireland’s most recognisable and controversial historical figures, blamed for a series of major atrocities, including notorious massacres at Drogheda and Wexford and mass deportations to … Read more

PAINTING DUBLIN 1886–1949: VISUALISING A CHANGING CITY

KATHRYN MILLIGAN Manchester University Press £80 9781526144102 Reviewed by Sylvie Kleinman Sylvie Kleinman is a Visiting Research Fellow at Trinity College, Dublin, and a former Governor and Guardian of the National Gallery of Ireland. This lucid book moves beyond conventional Irish art history and representations of Dublin. While visually, landscape and the west somewhat defined … Read more

IRISH COUNTRY FURNITURE AND FURNISHINGS, 1700–2000

CLAUDIA KINMONTH Cork University Press €39 ISBN 9781782054054 Reviewed by John Gibney John Gibney is Assistant Editor with the RIA’s Documents on Irish Foreign Policy series and is the author of A short history of Ireland, 1500–2000 (Yale, 2017). Irish country furniture and furnishings has its origins in Kinmonth’s Irish country furniture, 1700–1950, originally published … Read more