Ireland
Fathers, sons and the beauty of a “borrowed” book
I spent the weekend in Dublin; consequently, I am suffering from what Apthorpe would have called ‘Bechuana tummy’. For the uninitiated, Apthorpe is the premier fool in Men at Arms,… Continue reading
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Never accept meat from strangers
Never accept meat from strangers. That seems to be the lesson of the horsemeat scandal – at least for the ex-commercial director of Freeza Meats. In September 2012, an Environment Health… Continue reading
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The Gamal by Ciarán Collins – review
My editor told me to read this book and write this review. Six hundred words, he said. Just like the psychiatrist Dr. Quinn instructed Charlie, the protagonist of said book,… Continue reading
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Interview with a writer: Kevin Maher
Kevin Maher’s debut novel The Fields is set in the suburban streets of south Dublin in 1984. The story is narrated by Jim Finnegan: an innocent 13-year-old boy who lives… Continue reading
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Interview with a writer: John Banville
The salubrious surroundings of the Waldorf Hotel seem like a very apt setting to interview a master of style and sophistication. When I arrive in the lobby, John Banville is… Continue reading
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A great honour in memory of a remarkable man
I am delighted to say that my latest book, Bloody Sunday: truths, lies and the Saville Inquiry, has been jointly awarded the Christopher Ewart-Biggs memorial prize at a ceremony in… Continue reading
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Irish food safety chief now appointed Irish horse chief - Spectator Blogs
Some jokes just write themselves. Hurrah for Ireland: The former head of the Food Safety Authority of Ireland has been appointed chairman of Horse Sport Ireland. Prof Patrick Wall, who… Continue reading
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Review – Shall We Gather At The River, by Peter Murphy
Shall We Gather At The River is a book of unfortunate endings — the stories of nine suicides hang from a plot-line that tells of a freak flood in the… Continue reading
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Horse meat in burgers might not be as harmless as you think
This week’s discovery that some burgers sold in UK supermarkets contain up to 29 per cent horse meat was met with a combination of concerns about the labelling and sourcing… Continue reading
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Irish Newspapers Attempt to Kill the Internet - Spectator Blogs
If Andrew Sullivan offers one example of how to thrive in the confusing, difficult, exciting new media world then, by god, the Irish newspaper industry offers another. The Irish newspaper… Continue reading
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Ireland and Abortion: Cruelty disguised as piety, cowardice misrepresented as principle. - Spectator Blogs
Oh, Ireland! You knew it would come to this. Today’s Irish Times carries the appalling story of the death of Savita Halappanavar, a dentist in Galway, who died in hospital… Continue reading
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The Great Irish Famine revisited
The bare statistics of the Great Irish Famine are chilling enough: in 1845-55 more than a million people died of starvation and disease and a further two million emigrated. Ireland’s… Continue reading
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Interview: Mary Robinson
In 1990 Mary Robinson became Ireland’s first female president. As a progressive liberal, Robinson seemed a very unlikely candidate for the job, in what was then, a deeply conservative country. … Continue reading
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Kevin Barry’s magic
Reading a short story by Kevin Barry is a bit like listening to a kraut-rock-record from the 1970s. The foundations are built on a solid rhythm. Then every so often,… Continue reading
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A Jubilee moment of historic significance
Martin McGuiness will meet Her Majesty the Queen and shake her hand in Northern Ireland. This is a seminal moment. It does not change McGuiness’s commitment to a united Ireland,… Continue reading
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Bondholders are sheep — and they’re flocking out of the euro pen
Sweden’s Anders Borg (Fraser’s favourite finance minister) is wrong, says Citigroup. Bondholders and deposit holders are not like wolves, as Borg has made them out to be. They’re more like… Continue reading
9 CommentsCardinal Brady Should Resign
Last night, I finally watched last week’s BBC This World documentary investigating the latest stage of the child abuse scandal that is destroying the Catholic Church in Ireland and, like… Continue reading
10 CommentsUp Down and More of This Irish Anarchy
A propos nothing at all except coming across it in a comment over at Slugger O’Toole, here’s a jolly tale of 1960s Irish anarchism: One day in the late 1960s,… Continue reading
2 CommentsBertie Ahern’s Greatest Trick: Shaming the Shameless
My friend Ciaran Byrne is right: If Rupert Murdoch owned Fianna Fail he’d close it down. The Mahon Tribunal’s report into the flagrant corruption at the heart of the planning… Continue reading
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What will the UK’s proposed ECHR reforms actually come to?
Two items of news that may unsettle stomachs in Euroland today: i) that Ireland is planning to hold a referendum on the new European fiscal treaty, and ii) that the… Continue reading
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