Brando – The Fun Side by Aubrey Malone (Bear Manor Media, €32.95) Famously we are advised by Monty Python to look on the bright side of life. And so we ought to. But the bright side of Marlon Brando? He made his first impact as an actor playing a sullen angry young man in films that…
Irish Doctors in the Second World War by PJ Casey, KT Cullen, and JP Duignan (Merrion Press, €29.99/£25.99) This is a comprehensive account of the Irish doctors who served with the Allied forces in World War II. This is for all intents and purposes an untold story, but one that needed to be told for…
Time was when William Vincent Wallace was a household name with his music gracing many an operatic stage and concert venue and being played and sung in many a homely parlour. However, time and fashions change and what is enjoyed by one generation may well be relegated to obscurity by the next. With soprano Rachel…
Modern Ireland, conceived by many in positions of power and influence as a secular entity that has thrown off the shackles of religion, is more complex that one might think. This Ireland has its heroes, heroines and gurus, including the late Sinead O’Connor and recently deceased writer Edna O’Brien. It is ironic that both of…
A Summer with Pascal Antoine Compagnon, translated by Catherine Porte (The Belknap Press / Harvard University Press, £19.95 / €23.60) Pensées by Blaise Pascal, translation edited by Pierre Zoberman with an introduction by David Wetsel, with notes by both (Catholic University of America Press, £29.99 / €35.50 Pope Francis published an Apostolic Letter in June 2023…
Dublin from 1970 to 1990: The city transformed by Joseph Brady (Four Court Press, review of Joe Brady, €24.95 / £18.50) This new book by Joseph Brady marks the conclusion of a series devoted to the development of Dublin city, or perhaps we might say the Dublin region, since circa 900 AD, Joseph Brady is a…
The History of the Church of Christ by Pierre Daniel-Rops (Cluny Media, in ten volumes, priced from $US 27.95/€25.50) Back in the post-war decades in Ireland, for many Catholics two authors stood out. One was the Jesuit Fr Frederick Copleston with his volumes of A History of Philosophy, which was perhaps a little too academic for…
man goes to a concert with his teenage daughter. It looks like the formula for a fun night – right? Wrong. Trap (12A) is an M Night Shyamalan film so you won’t be surprised to learn that it morphs into something of a Kafkaesque nightmare. Josh Hartnett plays the main role. Shyamalan’s daughter Saleka is…
Last week I finished the good, the bad and the ugly of the opening ceremony of the Olympics. Since then, I’ve enjoyed the genuine sportsmanship and especially the impressive achievements of the Irish competitors. Watching Paris Olympics 2024, on RTÉ 2 for the most part, I’ve found it noteworthy to see so many participants blessing…
Democracy and solidarity: On the cultural roots of America’s political crisis James Davison Hunter (Yale University Press, £30.00 / €36..00 / US$40.00 ) Some years ago, three married couples from Texas, USA, contacted us. They were touring Ireland in pursuit of their ancestors. They thought that we might be a branch of one of their family’s…
Peter Costello
Brendan O’Regan
Aubrey Malone