Reviewed by Orfhlaith Ni Bhriain A course director at the Irish World Academy of Music and Dance at the University of Limerick. For many years dance scholarship has been considered as a luxury niche and largely undervalued, and even entirely omitted from written accounts depicting the importance of culture in the development of Irish society. … Read more
Reviewed by Conor McNamara The 1916 Scholar in Residence at NUI Galway. Galway is a peculiar place—both an urban and a rural county, a congested district and a Gaeltacht region, idealised (and frequently misunderstood) by generations of artists. Accounts of the west frequently fail to engage with the harsh realities of life—or, worse still, romanticise … Read more
Reviewed by David Heffernan Has a volume of 70 ‘reform’ treatises on Tudor Ireland forthcoming from the Irish Manuscripts Commission. By the late fifteenth century English power in Ireland had declined dramatically. The civil wars in England had seen little attention paid to Ireland, and knowledge of the political state, economy and geography of Ireland … Read more
Reviewed by Thomas O’Loughlin Professor of Historical Theology at the University of Nottingham. For over a century and a half one manuscript has held a unique fascination for every serious student of Irish monasticism: Schaffhausen Stadtbibliothek Generalia 1. The reason for this fame is not only because it contains a complete text of the Life … Read more
Seán Beattie, Donegal in transition: the impact of the Congested Districts Board (Merrion Press, €21.95 pb, 298pp, ISBN 9781908928306). Fergus Whelan, God-provoking demo-crat: the remarkable life of Archibald Hamilton Rowan (New Island, €16.99 pb, 292pp, ISBN 9781848404601). Anthony Russell, John Mitchel and Jenny Verner: between two flags (Merrion, €19.99 pb, 267pp, ISBN 9781785370007). Tadhg O’Keeffe, … Read more