Read Ireland Book Review
Issue 300
W.B.Yeats: A Life II The Arch-Poet by R.F. Foster
Trade Paperback; 25.00 Euro / 31.00 USD / 17.00 UK; 800 pages
The acclaimed first volume of this definitive biography of W. B. Yeats left him in his fiftieth year, at a crossroads in his life. The subsequent quarter-century surveyed in The Arch-Poet takes in his rediscovery of advanced nationalism and his struggle for an independent Irish culture, his continued pursuit of supernatural truths through occult experimentation, his extraordinary marriage, and a series of tumultuous love affairs. Throughout he was writing his greatest poems: 'The Fisherman' and 'The Wild Swans at Coole' in their stark simplicity; the magnificently complex sequences on the Troubles and Civil War; the Byzantium poems; and the radically compressed last work - some of it literally written on his deathbed.
The drama of his life is mapped against the history of the Irish revolution and the new Irish state founded in 1922. Yeats's many political roles and his controversial involvement in a right-wing movement during the early 1930s are covered more closely than ever before, and his complex and passionate relationship with the developing history of his country remains a central theme. Throughout this book, the genesis, alteration, and presentation of his work (memoirs and polemic as well as poetry) is explored through his private and public life. The enormous and varied circle of Yeats's friends, lovers, family, collaborators, and antagonists inhabit and enrich a personal world of astounding energy, artistic commitment, and verve. Yeats constantly re-created himself and his work, believing that art was 'not the chief end of life but an accident in one's search for reality': a search which brought him again and again back to his governing preoccupations: sex and death. He also held that 'all knowledge is biography', a belief reflected in this study of one of the greatest lives of modern times.
Heaven Lies About Us by Eugene McCabe
Trade Paperback; 19.00 Euro / 24.00 USD / 12.00 UK; 310 pages [Add To Basket]
In these twelve stories, Eugene McCabe plumbs the soul of the Irish border counties, where confusion, divided loyalties, and heightened emotions are part of everyday life, whether that life is lived in the aftermath of 'the Great Hunger' or in the face of sectarian bitterness, suspicion and conflict. A master of arresting dialogue and intimate characterisation, celebrated as a major playwright and author of one of the most important Irish novels of the last fifty years, McCabe demonstrates his outstanding gift for short fiction in this revelatory and haunting collection.
Munster’s Mountains: 30 Walking, Scrambling and Climbing Routes by Denis Lynch
Paperback; 15.00 Euro / 18.00 USD / 10.00 UK; 120 pages
The mountains of Munster stretch from Kerry to Waterford, through Limerick, Cork and Tipperary. For this guidebook the author explored gullies and ridges with a technical/semi-technical element, a level above hillwalking involving scrambling and rock climbing. While including well-known routes, he also describes alternatives, offering a sense of exploration and adventure. Illustrated with maps and photographs, this book offers a range of options for challenging days on the hills and mountains of Munster.
Grace and Truth by Jennifer Johnston
Hardback; 22.50 Euro / 28.00 USD / 15.00 UK; 210 pages [Add To Basket]
Sally, an actress, has just returned from a long European tour to her house in Goatstown, and looks forward eagerly to seeing her husband, Charlie, again. When Charlie announces that he’s leaving her, Sally, devastated and furious, makes him pack his bags at once. But maybe, she wonders later, she really is too hard to live with? Weighed down by the unspoken secrets of two generations, and hoping for some glimmer of comfort, Sally turns to her grandfather, the frosty old Bishop she has never really known.
Exercising breathtaking control, the author writes about a subject society would prefer to forget, and is able to make the reader laugh and gasp with horror in equal measure. This novel is an unforgettable, powerful and compassionate work from one of Ireland’s finest writers.
The Real Chief: Liam Lynch by Meda Ryan
Paperback; 16.00 Euro / 19.00 USD / 11.00 UK; 220 pages
With the aid of Liam Lynch's personal letters, private documents and historical records, The Real Chief, traces the turbulent career of one of Ireland's greatest guerilla commanders from his birth in 1893 until his death twenty nine years later in the civil war when he ws killed in action on the Knockmeadlown mountains.
Children of Eve by Deirdre Purcell
Trade Paperback; 16.50 Euro / 20.00 USD / 11.00 UK; 372 pages [Add To Basket]
Eve Moraghan broke one of the great taboos when she abandoned her children as toddlers. Now adults, Arabella, Willow and Rowan have heard nothing of their mother since the day she walked out the door, headed no one knows where. Why she went, they just don't know. But now, it seems, they're about to find out. Their mother's been in an accident, and she's sent word that she wants to see her children. Their first reaction is to tell her to forget it. She gave up on them - why should they jump when she says so? And yet somehow they each find themselves on that plane, making the journey that will tell them what their past was all about - and open new doors into the future.
Limerick Boycott 1904: Anti-Semitism in Ireland by Dermot Keogh and Andrew McCarthy
Trade Paperback; 20.00 Euro / 25.00 USD / 15.00 UK; 161 pages [Add To Basket]
This book contains selected documents which indicate that even before 1904, concerns existed in official circles regarding alleged activities of Jewish traders – supposedly selling recycled tea and getting a lien on land and property. This prompted Dublin Castle to investigate the activities of the Jewish community in 1903. In January 1904, the Jewish community in Limerick experienced a backlash in the form of violent assaults, economic boycott and social ostracisation. Keogh and McCarthy explore why this happened, why these events in Limerick remained a localised event and the consequences for the Jewish community.
Famine in Cork City by Michelle O’Mahony
Paperback; 17.00 Euro / 21.00 USD / 12.00 UK; 190 pages, with black-and-white photo insert [Add To Basket]
One hundred and sixty years ago Ireland’s Great Famine began. Within five years, some two and half million people had died. Thousands had fled to the hated workhouses, hoping desperately for some relief. This book sheds light on the horrific physical conditions of the inmates in one such workhouse, Cork Workhouse (now St. Finbarr’s Hospital), and explores the tragic effects of the famine as they unfolded in the city.
From Civil Rights to Armalites: Derry and the Birth of the Irish Troubles 2nd edition by Niall O Dochartaigh
Paperback; 26.00 Euro / 33.00 USD / 19.00 UK; 333 pages [Add To Basket]
From Civil Rights to Armalites traces and analyses the escalation of conflict in Northern Ireland from the first civil rights marches to the verge of full-scale civil war in 1972, focusing on the city of Derry. It explains how a peaceful civil rights campaign gave way to increasing violence, how the IRA became a major political force and how the British army became a major party to the conflict. It provides the essential context for understanding the events of Bloody Sunday and a new chapter brings significant new material to the public debate around the Bloody Sunday Inquiry.
A Dark Day on the Blaskets by Micheal O Dubhshlaine
Trade Paperback; 15.00 Euro / 18.00 USD / 10.00 UK; 255 pages [Add To Basket]
In the summer of 1909, Eibhlin Nic Niocaill arrived on the Dingle Peninsula in the extreme south-west of Ireland. One of the finest scholars in the new national movement, she had come from Dublin to study the West Kerry dialect of Irish. Here she explored the countryside and traveled to the Great Blaskeet, spending an intense, mystical month on the island, meeting the inhabitants, whose lifestyle had changed little in 200 years. This book is a fascinating insight into Blasket Island life, life on the mainland, and life in Dublin in the early part of the last century.
Rebels by Peter De Rosa
Paperback; 13.00 Euro / 15.50 USD / 8.50 UK; 535 pages [Add To Basket]
Rebels tells the exciting story of Easter 1916, a key date in the history of Irish Republicanism. The IRA always claim their authority comes from the martyred heroes of 1916. This book will enable the reader to judge finally whether this claim is true or not.
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