Twentieth-century Ireland: Nation and state

New Gill History of Ireland #6

by Dermot Keogh

With the emphasis on the South, this book looks at the island of Ireland since partition and examines the performances of the two entities created by the collapse of the old Union. The book looks at the development of Irish states of mind and follows the great change from the dominant farmer-shopkeeper rural culture of the 1930s and 1940s to the more urban, cosmopolitan attitudes of recent decades. Overshadowing all the achievements and failures of independent Ireland has been the spectre of Northern Ireland. The author sees Northern Ireland as a self-contained problem and refuses to blame the Troubles for the shortcomings of the Republic in the 1990s.

Genres: History, Ireland, Nonfiction

400 pages, Paperback

First published June 1, 1994

About the author

Dermot Keogh was Professor of History and Emeritus Jean Monnet Professor of European Integration Studies at University College Cork.

Reviews

[Heliosærkana de Gablæbregða · Rating 2 out of 5]

About two years ago I purchased this at a small bookshop in a local grocery store. Based on the name and the author's apparent irish lineage, I felt confident in adding this to my library. It had remained unread for some time, until I finally decided to delve into it for my 100th book this year. I'm glad to have finally finished it, but not so much for good reason.

My biggest criticism is in regards to how the information the author gathered is primarily sourced in the empires of england, france, and usa. There seems not one primary source in one of the many colleges of information in ireland itself. The author seems even to disregard potential analysis of the people of the north, where a large portion of tragedy occurred. In the introduction the author states that the majority of his six years of study occurred in usa, in a university. I do not believe it possible to write well on a subject and yet not even be in the regions of the world discussed, using information from locals. At the most, he interviews irish politicians, rather than studying the ebb, flow, and erratic social politics of the people themselves.

Around the beginning, on the topic of the civil war, the author explains the anti-treaty vs. pro-treaty provisional govt conflict as one of a logical government (who betrayed the cause of unity), working with england to suppress dissent of what he refers to as the fascist IRA. He makes the comparison of the time of the 20s as one of fascist uprising in italy and germany connecting with ireland. But he completely disregards the irish involvement in the liberal revolutionary wave of 1848, and the socialist revolutions of the early 20th century - such as the clear connection between the socialist-leaning ira uprising in 1916 and the revolution in russia in 1917, including preceding events. So, in reality, the fascists are the irish govt who betrayed their militant allies (like in germany's night of long knives), worked with atrocious empires (as italy did with germany, or germany to japan, usa to england), welcomed english occupation (like germany in the 'italian social republic'), and justified it by projecting these awful political structures onto a rebellious force for irish unity, in an attempt by the govt and this author to eliminate irish nationalist dissent.

Further, he even later gives extensive detail into the IRA's connections with the soviet union, and the active fusion of the ira's activity and connections with other groups of left-wing ideology. And yet, the author seems firmly narrow-minded with his comparison of the ira to that of the nazi party of germany. It is offensive, insulting, reactionary, and politico-psychological projection of insecurity. It also doesn't make any sense, considering even he presents the ira's relationship to the left (both national and international) as being longer and stronger in the organizations' history. Any connection to germany during the second world war was solely out of convenience considering both germany and the ira were enemies of england. Yet he often quotes irish fascists in order to condition our perception of those leaders as being good and intelligent. The lack of equal number of quotes from the ira and anti-treaty opposition has a silencing and dehumanizing effect on that opposition.

All this has me thinking that the author seems to have a problem with irish nationalism. In one section he refers to a censorship worker as 'saving the day' against another censorship worker being convinced to not censor either the word 'royal' or 'national' from a lifeboat institution's name. This seems to imply on the author's part, that he doesn't support the removal of ties to the english empire. This is a problem, considering such views tarnish the legitimacy of an irish history book. Nonetheless, he goes into good detail about the ridiculous actions of the irish censorship board. He quotes one author as having said that being a writer in ireland means having to live in exile. This, along with the static religiosity, the lazy political structure, the betrayal of cultural icons in writing and other art, all has me thinking the irish society is a backwards backwater of no true advancement for the people. Which is unfortunate, since the history of the celtic peoples, the wondrous stories and lifestyles, all have a significant impact on my identity. All these wonderful things are eliminated or repressed by the peoples' subservience to the catholic church and to monotheism in general.

Eventually, partway through the first chapter, he begins to get a slightly better, more neutral view of events. He even goes a bit into criticising the govt's dependence on the church's advice and guidance, and the church's irrational behaviour toward the dancing irish citizens who look up at the stars together rather than praying hail maries. But throughout this book the author doesn't mention much at all about the northern counties. Lots of historical name-dropping, naming of organizations and political parties, and listing of dates and numbers. All with no reasonable sense of substance, no significant background information - if any - and overall a sense of repetition and slowness. When talking about political activity, such as elections and economic plans, it grows into a slog of tiresome, boring, political laziness. And overall things seem to get more boring, as if the author is just using this info as filler history. Eventually it was a chore to read each section of the text, and so I found myself skipping entire paragraphs due to not being anything more than some sort of historical list.

He'll go into some detail about the new govt after an election, new positions made or the officials changed out, but this information is nothing of substance when he says nothing else about the consequences, the purpose, the meaning about any of it. And anything significant from events like this, the author gives no following details as to why such a change is significant. For example, toward the last few pages of the book the author writes about Mary Robinson, a socialist as the Labour Party/Workers Party candidate for president. She wins the election and the author quotes that her election had truly 'rocked the system'. For the rest of the book, this woman is not mentioned in passing or in detail. But, I did make several important notes in my reading, so as to come back to and do further independent research.

When reaching the time in Ireland's history of the coming of the troubles, and its subsequent issues, the author seems to pass over it disinterestedly. He devotes perhaps four pages to these issues specifically (without being distracted partway through by giving meaningless detail about irish elections), and the content is highly disagreeable. He brings foremost the consistent regard for anti-ira and pro-partition views and figures as being of 'wisdom' and 'courage'. He also describes the activities of the different ira groups as specifically targeting children and women (which is wrong). He goes not at all into the rampant, murderous violence committed by english troops, police, and those who support them, against irish catholics and anti-partitionists in the northern counties. Instead, he vaguely describes 'security measures' and justifies the existence of such measures by placing the blame on the ira.

Here he also gives no respect to the rebellious memory of hunger-and-water strikers, and throughout the book it seems to him that such strikes and deaths are simple, easy, and unimportant. The author describes activities to limit the effectiveness of the ira, and the interruptions of the hunger strikers, as 'wise' and 'courageous' - as if those strikers dying in succession, those rebels fighting the occupation of their land, are not. When in reality, such individuals and actions have done far more for unity than the lazy and complacent govt of ireland or the violent and imperialistic govt of england. What little he does to discuss the historical troubles, is an affront to the political resistance to partition, and that ceaseless fight for an independent and unified ireland.

This history book, while mostly boring and fraught with logical fallacies, contradictions, irrational justifications, and misplaced opinions, has me interested in further study. Not by this author, no indeed. But, there is an interest I have in studying history, reading the sides I most identify with (such as those series of 'people's history' books I appreciate), and seeking out sources mentioned. I'm interested in reading as many (good) banned/challenged books as possible, and ireland alone has thousands in its history. This book goes into some detail about this, even giving titles to a few of such banned books I have a new interest in.

Well, I'm now aware that this book is in a series of history books about ireland, all written by different authors. This gives me the potential of unique perspectives as well as an extensive analysis of historical events. So, while this book is disappointing for the most part, it has me thinking of what else and what better history books I could read. At this point I do wonder how different the original edition is, having been written by a different author. I wonder whether the original would be more radical, more interesting, more Irish.