I gaze as I write at two photographs, presented to me by their subjects’ grandchildren: one of Seán O’Casey’s sister Isabella (the ‘Ella’ of his semi-fictionalised autobiographies), and the other of her husband, Nicholas Beaver—or, as O’Casey called him, Benson. The photographs appear to have been taken in the mid-1890s. Her face, framed above her … Read more
Inside less than three weeks 160 prisoners were tried by field general court martial. The trials took place in secret and none of the prisoners were represented by lawyers. Most lasted less than twenty minutes. This book provides a powerful and compelling account of how the rule of law disintegrated in a time of crisis. … Read more
Garden history was long the province of the amateur. In recent decades it has become more the activity of the professional academic, with chairs and lectureships in a number of universities in both the US and the UK. The results of research are published in two principal scholarly journals, Garden History and Studies in the … Read more
‘’Pon my word, taking it all in, that young man didn’t do so badly by my Custom House’, muses a congenial ghost of James Gandon in a Dublin Opinion cartoon from 1953; he is pondering Michael Scott’s boldly modernist Busáras from George’s Quay, to the right of his mostly reconstructed yet eternally graceful masterpiece of … Read more
This significant and provocative book raises many questions about history-writing in Ireland. It is based on previously published articles by John Regan concerning the Treaty, Michael Collins and Southern nationalism, sectarianism during the Irish revolution and the intellectual influence of Conor Cruise O’Brien. Regan’s contention is that since 1968 Irish historians have laboured under the … Read more