Profile for John L. Murphy
Latest posts from John L. Murphy (see all)
John L. Murphy has posted 5 times (1 in the last month).
Manchán Magan’s ‘Oddballs: A Novel of Affections’: Book Review
Tweet A skilled chronicler in travel narratives and documentaries of those who wander the fringes, Manchán Magan’s debut novel follows four characters on the fringe. Two of them, teenaged Rachel and her quasi-aunt Charlotte, collide after a long estrangement in New Hampshire, and take off on Charlotte’s Wiccan pilgrimage to ye olde England of, as [...] more »
Joshua Bloom and Waldo E. Martin, Jr’s ‘Black Against Empire’: Book Review
Tweet Certainly, after the quick rise and repression of the Occupy Movement, this study on an earlier radical faction who advocated more violent urban occupation and resistance merits reflection. Joshua Bloom (UCLA) and Waldo E. Martin, Jr (UC Berkeley) collaborate to present a study which relies not on oral interviews or ‘retrospective accounts’ colored by [...] more »
Tim Robinson’s ‘Connemara: A Little Gaelic Kingdom’: Book Review
Tweet While the last published of this trilogy, Robinson tells us first off that this is meant to be the second installment. It nestles into the southern Connemara coastline. This Cambridge-trained mathematician turned Connacht cartographer tracks down its traditional place names and wanders in the lore and the landscapes of these locales near his Roundstone [...] more »
Patrick McGinley’s ‘That Unearthly Valley: A Donegal Childhood’: Book Review
Tweet In Bogmail and Foggage, Patrick McGinley sent up the Irish (could he or it be otherwise?) murder mystery genre. He scooped dollops of encyclopaedic wit and mordant satire into these entertainments. A later saga proved more somber and meditative, the Black and Tan War ending as The Lost Soldier’s Song, while The Trick of [...] more »
Kevin Myers’ ‘Watching the Door’: Book Review
Tweet This reads as if a mad picaresque tale. Myers as first a reporter for RTÉ and then as a freelance journalist with no real experience, finds himself wandering into savagery as he hastens north as the Troubles explode. A soldier dies next to him; he witnesses an IRA ambush; he sees children shot to [...] more »
Latest comments from John L. Murphy (see all)
John L. Murphy has commented 3 times (1 in the last month).
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Books
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Book Review: The McGurk’s Bar Bombing
Tweet The McGurk’s Bar Bombing: Collusion, Cover-Up and a Campaign for Truth with a foreword by Colin Wallace, just published by Frontline Noir, is the first book by Ciarán MacAirt, grandson of one of those killed in the bombing and the most visible campaigner on behalf of the victims and their families. The book pulls together the [...] read our review » -
The Written World
Tweet Here’s something to keep you occupied over the weekend. [Will there be a quiz? - Ed] Possibly… The BBC magazine has an short and interesting, but un-embeddable, audio slide-show of Melvyn Bragg’s Radio 4 five-parter, In Our Time: The Written World. The British Library has more online information about the texts and technology featured in [...] read our review » -
Unionists, Loyalists, and Conflict Transformation. A book about how things are changing.
Tweet Unionists, Loyalists, and Conflict Transformation in Northern Ireland is a new academic tome by lecturer and researcher Lee Smithey. In the book the Pennsylvania academic outlines his findings based on 67 interviews over eighteen months with grassroots activists in unionist and loyalist communities and organisations. This is largely a book about men, even though [...] read our review »
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Comment on Joshua Bloom and Waldo E. Martin, Jr’s ‘Black Against Empire’: Book Review
on 23 April 2013 at 7:04 pm
Rory, both points taken. I am limited by Slugger to 600 words for a review, so I opted for the personal touch and it may be too much so in that paragraph. Ron Karenga was an activist and professor in Long Beach CA who founded US, who turned out to be a rival black nationalist organization to the Panthers; he also is credited with the invention of Kwanza[a] (the authors in their book twice use the spelling I did in the review) in 1966. US literally fought it out by gunfire with the Panthers at UCLA in 1969 to deadly results, so this episode reverberated for me as a student years later, “next door”.
I agree with your comment about Kwanzaa vis-a-vis holidays and legends; this review in this aspect is pitched more from my own perspective, although I tried to connect it in the short space to the Irish civil rights reverberations. Thanks for both remarks…
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Comment on Kevin Myers’ ‘Watching the Door’: Book Review
on 4 November 2011 at 6:40 pm
Dorothy Macardle was from a brewing family, and she spent ten years on what was regarded as the Fianna Fáil version of official history, perhaps a bit unfairly. In the 1999 reprint (nothing added, but from the second rev. ed, of 1965, reissued by Wolfhound Press, Dublin) of this thousand-page plus tome, Terry DeValera has a brief preface, insisting on her independence of thought in terms of Dev’s own strong-minded positions. She also wrote fiction and plays early on, and she represented Dev’s paper the ‘Irish Press’ at the League of Nations. She was from Dundalk, was jailed for republican activism, and was in the service of the Cause 1916-23. She died in 1959.
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Comment on Kevin Myers’ ‘Watching the Door’: Book Review
on 3 November 2011 at 9:32 pm
Hi all–I reviewed on Amazon & my blog a while ago Malachi O’Doherty’s ‘Telling Year’ as well as ‘I Was a Teenaged Catholic’ and ‘Empty Pulpits’; I admired his ‘Trouble with Guns’ way back. In my original blog review (5-5-11) of ‘Watching’, 1500 words, I briefly compared Myers with O’D's 1972 account.
I knew of the reputation of Myers (in reference to his stance on the ‘ra as well as the odd duck Francis Stuart regarding that ‘worm in the rose’ libel fracas) from reading his journalism before opening this. I decided to give it a fair go, without prejudice, and despite some self-aggrandising moments, which Myers himself acknowledges more or less, I tried to convey in the limited space my reactions. My reviews attempt to convey my stance without getting bogged down in partisanship, no easy feat on such topics as this.
I look forward to overcoming my ‘distance’ from the fracas and submitting more (eclectic, too) book reviews to Slugger soon.
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