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Books

The Easter Rising’s road to hell — paved with good intentions

In an effort to make things better, the founding fathers of the Irish Republic made things much, much worse, according to Ruth Dudley Edwards’s The Seven

9 April 2016

9:00 AM

9 April 2016

9:00 AM

The Seven: The Lives and Legacies of the Founding Fathers of the Irish Republic Ruth Dudley Edwards

Oneworld Publications, pp.416, £18.99, ISBN: 9781780748658

While reading this book in a London café, I was politely buttonholed by an Irishman: ‘Sorry to disturb you, but I saw what you were reading and wondered how far back it went.’ I answered that, as it was a group biography of the men who led the Dublin Easter Rising of 1916, it began with the eldest of them, Tom Clarke, in the mid-19th century.

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