The Catholics of Ulster: a history, Marianne Elliott. (Allen Lane, Penguin Press, £25) ISBN 0713994649

I read this book full on the heels of journalist Susan McKay’s Northern Protestants: an Unsettled People, and just as avidly. Both books emanate from troubled hearts asking the question—what was this thirty-years war in Northern Ireland all about? Susan McKay’s book belongs to the present and is the testimony of Protestants from various parts … Read more

Ireland and Empire: colonial legacies in Irish history and culture, Stephen Howe. (Oxford University Press, £25) ISBN 0198208251

Stephen Howe calls his Ireland and the Empire ‘a discourse about discourses’. It is actually a cut-and-paste polemic against nationalist historiography, post-colonial discourses, interdisciplinary literary criticism, Field Day, and Edward Said. Howe doesn’t like the comparisons the Irish make between themselves and others. Managerial rather than discursive, the book strings together obiter dicta, ceremonial academic … Read more

Prelude to the Easter Rising: Sir Roger Casement in Imperial Germany, Reinhard Doerries. (Frank Cass, £21.85) ISBN 0714680702

On 28 June 1914, Sir Roger Casement delivered an oration beside Shane O’Neill’s stone, above Cushendun, deep in the Glens of Antrim. It brought to an end six months of recruiting of Irish Volunteers and proved to be his last public address in Ireland. The following day he travelled to Glasgow and from there by … Read more