RECOMMENDED For decades, one simple question has split the Irish on both sides of the Atlantic into two warring factions: Do you love or loathe The Quiet Man, that 1952 stage Irish classic starring John Wayne and Maureen O'Hara, and directed by John Ford? Ford himself was often more Irish than the Irish themselves, making up an ultra-Gaelic name for himself, and playing … [Read more...] about Book Reviews
Irish author
Remembrance
The potato blight arrived in Ireland in the late summer of 1845.Pest, parasite, fungus, invisible and invincible,it stuck across Europe, the same sudden, unstoppable invasion everywhere. Infection, corruption, devastation.But Ireland was a special case.Ireland was a place where for millions of people, the potato was neither staple nor supplement, but sustenance: … [Read more...] about Remembrance
Book Reviews
FICTION For almost five decades now, legendary newspaperman Jimmy Breslin has dispensed wisdom, wit and justice with his hard-hitting columns. But Breslin has also published a dozen books now, and his novels have inspired a generation of Irish American writers. His 1973 novel World Without End, Amen chronicled the civil rights movements in both America and Northern Ireland, … [Read more...] about Book Reviews
Maeve Binchy Reflects on Her Career
No one tells stories like Irish writer Maeve Binchy. Humane, down-to-earth, funny, her novels have captured imaginations on both sides of the Atlantic in a way most authors only dream of. Millions of her fans were disappointed when she announced last year she was retiring from both novel writing and her weekly column with The Irish Times. The newly released Scarlet Feather … [Read more...] about Maeve Binchy Reflects on Her Career
Chapter & Hearse
"For twelve long years I've suffered this damned cat.../ though more than once I've threatened violence/ the brick and burlap in the river recompense/ for mounds of furballs littering the house." – "Grimalkin" "Grimalkin," Tom Lynch informs me, "is dead." I couldn't help it, I had to know. The cat lasted almost eight years after the poem was written. "I had told … [Read more...] about Chapter & Hearse