Literary and Historical Essays 1846

by Thomas Osborne Davis

Thomas Osborne Davis (1814-45), poet, essayist, thinker, and journalist, was leader of the Young Irelanders, and founder in 1842 with Charles Gavan Duffy and John Dillon of the weekly Nation, which rapidly became an influential voice of nationalist opinion. Although he died prematurely, Davis's sway over Irish thinking in the nineteenth century can hardly be exaggerated, his ideas reaching the writers of the Irish Literary Revival through the Fenian, John O'Leary. Davis's influence extended from parliamentary constitutionalists to the founders of Sinn Fein who, as Padraic Colum recalled, 'read and re-read him until some of them knew certain of his pages by heart'. His Literary and Historical Essays, gathered from the Nation and other journals, and issued immediately after the shock of his death, contain his most important and effectual writings on Irish politics and culture.

252 pages, Hardcover

First published January 1, 1998

About the author

Thomas Osborne Davis was a Irish writer and the chief organizer and poet of the Young Ireland movement.