This Sunday the whole world, it seems, will for a few hours become Irish, or at least recover enough of their nominal ‘Irishness’ to join in the fun. President Biden, in the name of the American people, will accept yet again a giant bowl of flourishing shamrock, and avow his Irish roots. Streets around the…
Category: Books
Coming to terms with the way we live today
Frank Litton We learn two things from history. Assumptions quite different from those that frame our world shaped the actions of our predecessors. The second follows from this. World views do change. They are human constructions that endure for long periods. We might think of them as buildings, but if we do, they are buildings…
A Dublin celebration of the Irish Diaspora
St Patrick’s day sees the arrival of great numbers of visitors from abroad, many of them part of, or deeply interested in the Irish diaspora. This seems an appropriate moment then to visit the EPIC presentation down on Customs House in the Dublin Financial Centre. EPIC stands for Irish Emigration Museum, by the way. This is…
Life stories written on the faces of the young and old
The latest partnered exhibition at the National Gallery, featuring as it does the works of a series of great artists, Rubens, Rembrandt, Vermeer and a few others, is a remarkable show, not so much for its bravura accomplishments of style and setting, but for its concentration on the wonderful landscapes of the human face through…
At home in Ireland: How and why our ancestors lived the way they did
A love of home, ‘one’s own place’, is said to have characterised Irish people from the earliest days. These days, when people remove themselves to as far away as the Antipodes, there is still, even in the sunshine of Bondi Beach, that melancholy longing for the old place at home. How we lived in the past is…
A small girl’s creative walk with her father
This is an original book. Whereas most books for young readers try to involve them in word and meaning, this is a book without words. But it still manages to speak volumes. Significantly it is dedicated by creator Tatyana Feeney to her own father, so the pages must carry for her a hidden level of…
Reading in Lent: a different approach
Even for those who, as they say these days, ‘are not religious’, reading the New Testament is an experience which few set themselves to have. I also believe people should, in this day and age, have some acquaintance with the Torah and the Quran, and try to understand what they mean to Jews and Muslims,…
The ever-changing American Irish
Mark Holan This year’s fraught US presidential campaigns have got many Americans wondering what has become of the once powerful ‘Irish vote’? This problem comes into even sharper focus with this recently published history of the Irish American strain by Prof. Timothy J. Meagher. Meagher was once associate professor of history at Catholic University of…
A book to enlighten your Lenten reading
Recently Fr Timothy Radcliffe OP was in Dublin to give the annual Patrick Finn Lecture at St Mary’s, Haddington Road. It was an opportunity which many took to hear one of the more influential Catholic theologians of today. It was judged by those who attended to have been a great success. Those who might wish…
Angela Merkel and the mystery of national unity
In the politics of recent times the German Chancellor stands out for her major efforts to sustain the unity of Europe. This may well be because her own life grew out of an experience of what happens when nations are divided. When, in the aftermath of World War II, Germany – an historical unity only…