What We Talk About When We Talk About Faith by Peter Stanford (Hodder & Stoughton, £14.99) Emily Keyes Though religion implies community, it is easy to forget that religion is also an individual pursuit, with each practitioner possessing their own understanding of faith. This is what Peter Stanford, a long-time journalist for the Catholic Herald with…
John Redmond. Selected letters and memoranda, 1880-1918 edited by Dermot Meleady (Merrion Press, €29.99/£26.99) Ian d’Alton On March 6, 1918, John Redmond, leader of the Irish Parliamentary Party, died – “a broken-hearted man”, in his own words – at the relatively young age of 61 years. History was in the process of overtaking him, and what…
A Time of Our Lives: How We Grew Up From the 1940s to the 1960s by Gerald Rice (Order from A Time of Our Lives Ltd., 11 Mornington Green, Trim, Co. Meath; €10 + €2.95 p&p; e-mail: atimeofourlives@gmail.com) This is an unusual autobiography which will resonate with Gerald Rice’s contemporaries both in Ireland and the…
On Tuesday night of last week the Catholic Bishops made a significant intervention in the Eighth Amendment debate, issuing a humane and measured statement. On the Nine News (RTE 1) that night, Archbishop Eamon Martin expressed dismay that the right to life of unborn children could be “obliterated” from the Constitution. On Wednesday’s Morning Ireland…
TheWorld of Books by the books editor There is a striking phrase quoted in Dr Ian d’Alton’s review across the page. The author of the book in question takes on those who criticize Redmond for not holding to what Ronan Fanning characterized as ‘the nationalist delusion that the partition of Ireland was avoidable’. Meleady…
Unless (15A) What would make a normal young girl from a privileged home in Toronto drop out of college to live on the streets without telling anyone why? That’s the central conundrum surrounding this captivating moodpiece from Alan Gilsenan which begins – appropriately – with a song from Canada’s prime avatar of angst and alienation,…
All the Red Ties: From Catholic Boy Scouts of Ireland in Donnybrook 1927 to Scouting Ireland 2017 by Dermot Lacey (Carrowmore, €15.00) The development of Scouting in Ireland was shaped by the major cultural, political and religious traditions in the country. The Irish B-P scouts traced their beginnings to Lieut-General Robert Baden-Powell and the…
Karl Henry’s Healthy Living Handbook by Karl Henry (Penguin Ireland, €14.99) Emily Keyes January may be in the rear-view mirror, but that doesn’t mean the world has forgotten the aphorism, ‘new year, new me’. Thankfully Karl Henry, one of Ireland’s most famous personal trainers, has a new book on healthy living that does not…
I could hardly write this column without reference to last week’s weather event. It dominated media news and current affairs, perhaps to an excessive degree. I certainly thought it was going over the top when it was prominent on Claire Byrne Live, as far back as last Monday night, and until the snow actually arrived much…
Pat O’Kelly I was regaled at the National Concert Hall recently by two award-winning young pianists – Alexander Bernstein and Fiachra Garvey, both former pupils of John O’Conor at the RIAM. Accompanied with spontaneous aplomb by the RTÉ NSO, they conveyed the wit and charm of Francis Poulenc’s effervescent Concerto for Two Pianos written…
Brendan O’Regan
Peter Costello
Aubrey Malone