From the Outside: Rethinking Church Doctrine by Fr Tony Flannery (Red Stripe/Orpen Press, €15/£13.99) Fr Tony Flannery CSsR has been barred from his public ministry for nine years and was most recently in the public eye having declined to sign a document from the Congregation for the Doctrine of Faith (CDF) that would have led to…
The Bogman by Walter Macken [1952] (Modern Irish Classics/New Island Books, €11.95) Walter Macken may be a familiar name to some of our readers. In the 1960s, he was a hit author, with a best-selling trilogy of historical novels, and before that he was a successful actor and playwright with the Abbey Theatre. Knowing this, New…
Time to Call Home by Hugh O’Donnell (Veritas, €14.99/£12.90) Fr Hugh O’Donnell SDB lives in Dublin’s inner-city, where he helps minister to the local parish. But in his writing and poetry he explores what he sees as “ecological spirituality”. Doubtless the cityscape that surrounds his daily life sharpens the contrast with what should be the true ecological…
I’m thoroughly cheesed off with media outlets telling us how great they are. Unfortunately, it’s more often the spin than the reality. So, for example, RTÉ is telling us constantly, with very slick video ads, how great they are with news, trust, integrity and journalism. And yet, in current affairs coverage, I think they are…
A long-standing friend invited myself and two other close acquaintances to lunch at the Royal Dublin Society (RDS) recently – outside of course in accordance with Government regulations. But the sun shone and the company was convivial. As might be expected the conversation was never far from music and we recalled the RDS’ contribution to…
An Unsung Hero: Tom Crean – Antarctic Survivor by Michael Smith (Gill Books, €19.99 / £12.50) Tom Crean was a hero of the legendary Polar expeditions of the early decades of the twentieth century. The explorer faced nature in all its raw energy in a way later travellers never did. Crean was born on a…
The Black & Tans 1920-1921: A Complete Alphabetical, Short History and Genealogical Guide by Jim Herlihy (Four Courts Press, €50/£45.00, also in paperback) Back in 1971 the Rev. Professor Edward Norman remarked in his controversial History of Modern Ireland that journalist Richard Bennett›s sensational 1959 book on the Black and Tans, the only one that then existed, read…
Research in Victorian newspapers and journals occupies much of my time away from these pages. The other day searching through the 1891 volume of WT Stead’s influential Review of Reviews, I came across an item which it seemed to me would be of great interest to many of our readers, a “lost poem” by no less…
Fatima was originally scheduled for last August. Its release was delayed for almost a year because of Covid. The virus gives it a strangely appropriate backdrop. It’s like a metaphor for the horrors of World War I. The war underpins Marco Pontecorvo’s uplifting evocation of the beatific visions of three Portuguese children in 1917. Both…
Parnell and his times ed. by Joep Leerssen (Cambridge University Press, £30.00) Felix M. Larkin It is often difficult to find an appropriate print outlet for a scholarly paper prepared for a particular occasion or otherwise in a very specific context. The fruits of much research and reflection are thereby lost. A volume like this is,…
Brendan O’Regan
Peter Costello
Aubrey Malone