Are you satisfied now, ladies and gentlemen, you counsellors and therapists of all stripes, with my do-it-your-self-psychoanalysis? Despite my disdain for the so-called misery memoir, it is time to declare: my childhood was better than being brought up in an industrial school, or by an alcoholic or physically abusive parent; but, certainly by today’s ideals, … Read more
Build me a cabin in Utah Marry me a wife, catch rainbow trout Have a bunch of kids who call me “Pa” That must be what it’s all about That must be what it’s all about Bob Dylan, ‘Sign On The Window’, from New Morning (1970) When I was eighteen, during a summer spent working … Read more
My ear is pressed up against the past as if to the wall of a house that no longer exists. Richard Brautigan At 2pm on Friday the seventh of May, 1971, as Peter “Flipper” Groat coasted gently on his customized Triton 650 into the gravel car park to the rear of The Black Hand transport … Read more
The penny drops as I listen to RTE’s Liveline. There’s a highly articulate woman in her fifties, who is renting. Holding out little hope for the future, she pleads with the powers that be to solve the Housing Crisis, in its entirety, no more sticking plasters: “Solve it for everyone,” she stresses, “even if 50,000 … Read more
The noted American historian, and Putin critic,Timothy Snyder’s recent text Our Malady: Lessons in Liberty and Solidarity (2020) is a cri de coeur against almost non-existent healthcare rights in the U.S. – which the pandemic brought into sharp focus. The cossetted Yale professor saw the light, as his country failed to cope. Our Malady is … Read more
To understand the origins of the Irish Housing Crisis we also need to look beyond our shores, and excavate the substrate of the modern global financial order. This will reveal a slow journey towards the neoliberal financialisation of property as an asset today – overwhelmingly bought and sold regardless of the needs of society at … Read more
the perpetuation of debt, has drenched the earth with blood, and crushed its inhabitants under burthens ever accumulating. Thomas Jefferson, 1813. Laura’s Decision Laura has not found the job that will make her happy – more accurately, she does not want a job. Her vocation is reading, playing the cello, and, maybe, teaching. She is … Read more
I’m of an age to be intrigued by death. My 84-year-old grandmother, widowed, came to live with our family, and took over my bedroom. I was forced to give up the room, to share instead with a sibling. The old woman was hale and hearty, retained her wits, preserved her down to earth assessment of … Read more
Over the past few years, a broad consensus has emerged that in Ireland providing adequate protections for whistleblowing, and whistleblowers, is a lot more difficult to achieve in practice than in theory. In many fields, extreme real life consequences for a brave decision to go public with revelations of wrongdoing have been apparent. The protections … Read more
The appeal of exotic cuisines and esoteric diets has done little to diminish bread’s status as the primary foodstuff of the Western world, and many areas besides. Symbolic as the ‘staff of life’ and ubiquitous, the Oxford English Dictionary describes it in wholesome simplicity as a ‘well-known article of food prepared by moistening, kneading, and … Read more