The great English chemist James Lovelock conceived the Gaia (Gr. ‘goddess of earth’) Hypothesis in 1972, later developing this alongside American microbiologist Lynns Margulis. Later still, Lovelock, aged eighty-seven, was awarded the prestigious Wolston medal by the Geological Society of London for his pioneering concept. Now firmly embedded in the zeitgeist, the Gaia Hypothesis posits … Read more
On a crisp, sunny morning in Hebron in January of this year my friend Atta Jaber tells me: ‘The settlers have what they wanted and Randina sits on a chair.’ Atta resembles a Kerry farmer, one in particular comes to mind: the late Sam Brown from Maharees in West Kerry. He is sinewy, with a … Read more
Following a global trend since the arrival of the Internet, mainstream Irish media, including the so-called ‘paper of record’ the Irish Times, is increasingly required to sell itself. The days of someone reading a daily newspapers cover-to-cover are fading into nostalgic memories. Now editors feel obliged to dangle click-bait, and even fake news, often through … Read more
I have just returned from Hebron in the West Bank, a city where nearly sixty Palestinians have been extra-judicially executed by Israeli forces since the end of September 2015. On my last stint in Hebron, West Bank, while doing check point duty one morning one of my team mates overheard two very small children chatting: … Read more
Entering the dragon’s den I arrive twenty minutes late for a casting, but it doesn’t really matter. Only three other girls have found their way into the casting room so far; ‘girls’ being a euphemism – the youngest person in the room is a women in her early twenties. At a fashion casting we are … Read more
In the year of our Lord 2019, what remained engrained was an émigré from the hoi omphaloi of confusion and strife. The Easter in question came late on the calendar but much like the highly controversial transubstantiation, the bitter end of Holy Week started as it was in the beginning, is now and ever shall … Read more
Nightfalls. Creatures are on the move, Leaping, dancing, diving, digging, loving that’s the art of living, that’s the art of dying. Machines are slowing down Cars, trains, ships, aeroplanes I’m coming in now to land, from all those names the Pacific, the Wild Atlantic way, the Mediterranean, the Indian and Arctic Oceans the South China … Read more
‘Descend the stairs, bend your legs, melting one by one. / Open your mouth to the snake in the sand, swallowing you one by one.’ So begins the first single from our latest album. It’s one of my treasured moments in the meandering Loafing Heroes journey: in how it came about, how it was constructed, … Read more
I felt him sliver under my shirt as she belted me in with a quicksilver click. The shoulder strap muffled my mouth and eclipsed an eye. Mom sipped her coffee, singing along to the song on the radio, ‘One less egg to fry … ’ Only half of what lay ahead was in sight, but … Read more
Picture this scene. Next to a Martello tower, a grimy concrete shelter below which a motley crew, ranging from whooping lads to fragile ladies, make their way, often daily, into the ocean at Seapoint, Dublin. Some swim significant distances – measured in buoys and other landmarks – others simply ‘take the waters’. There are New … Read more