Jennifer Egan's Manhattan Beach is a journey through time and mores. ℘℘℘ In Manhattan Beach, Jennifer Egan makes a radical departure in style, language, and structure from her previous novel, the post-modern and Pulitzer Prize-winning A Visit from the Goon Squad. This latest work, labeled “historic fiction” and set between 1934 and 1946, tells of a Brooklyn Irish American … [Read more...] about Review of Books
Issues
Motherfoclóir: A New Kind of Irish Language Revival
Darach Ó Séaghdha has been putting the fun back into the Irish language by translating words into English in a humorous, thought-provoking way, and deftly using Twitter to expand his audience. He now continues the exercise in a new book, Motherfoclóir, in which he also reflects on the role the Irish language played in his own life. ℘℘℘ The people of Ireland have a strange … [Read more...] about Motherfoclóir: A New Kind of Irish Language Revival
Shamrocks and Salsa
Jerry Cox spent a lifetime ministering to California’s Mexican immigrants, and found similarities between Irish and Mexican cultures. ℘℘℘ Shortly after Jerry Cox was ordained a priest in San Francisco in 1950, the Irish American visited his relatives in Skibbereen, County Cork. That’s when great aunt Elizabeth Casey told him: “Welcome home, Father Jerry!” Noticing he was … [Read more...] about Shamrocks and Salsa
Sláinte! Flipping Over Pancake Tuesday
Once the winter holiday feasting frenzy ends, hundreds of ads bombard us with ways to lose weight. There is certainly a time to count calories, but then there is Fat Tuesday. Dieters beware. The two will never go together any better than oil and water. As the final day before Lent, Fat Tuesday has for almost two-thousand years been cause to consume high-calorie, … [Read more...] about Sláinte! Flipping Over Pancake Tuesday
Photo Album: Dad and J.F.K.
My father Cyril DeFever grew up on a dairy farm near Detroit, Michigan. His parents had immigrated to the U.S. from Belgium. My mother, Marie Clancy, the daughter of an insurance man, was Irish. Her grandfather grew up on Turbot Island off Connemara. Her uncle Robert Clancy was a U.S. senator. Dad boxed as a young man (Joe Louis’ manager wanted to manage him). He won the … [Read more...] about Photo Album: Dad and J.F.K.