Ireland
Don’t bother calling the doctor
‘If you are calling about sinusitis, sore throat, earache in children, infected inset bite from the UK not overseas, impetigo,…
Drama on the London Underground
The girl lay slumped against a wall in front of me and someone ran to push the emergency button. I…
I will miss my vote
I feel as if I first took part in a general election even before I was born. My father was…
A visit to ye olde Ireland
The £80 million super-yacht with a helicopter on the upper deck sat in the harbour, and we sat outside the…
A sea of troubles: The Coast Road, by Alan Murrin, reviewed
The sudden return of the liberated Colette Crowley to the Donegal fishing village of Ardglas stirs fear and resentment in the closed community
No one knows how to sell the European project to the Irish any more
A few days after having Sunday lunch at the hotel where Michael Collins ate his last meal, we found ourselves…
Home to mother: Long Island, by Colm Toibín, reviewed
The sequel to Brooklyn sees Eilis leave New York shocked and angry, and return to Enniscorthy – where everything is outwardly calmer, but much has changed
Amo Racing’s Flat supremacy
You don’t often walk into a racing yard and find the trainer engrossed with two owners –apropos of horse names…
Lefties don’t know anything about farming
The artists and hippies are re-wilding their land, which is to say doing nothing at all to it and watching…
Irish voters have refused to erase the family
It’s not been a particularly good weekend for the political establishment in Ireland. Two constitutional changes have been rejected by…
Ireland is falling out of love with Sinn Fein
Is the Sinn Fein star starting to wane? Support for the party has hit its lowest level for four years…
No laughing matter: accusations of transphobia wrecked Graham Linehan’s life
The comedian found himself out of work and out of his marriage when he challenged the transgender ideology that to be a man or women is about choosing an identity
I have moved into a house in Ireland I viewed once, then bought
With families chatting in the seats around me, a young girl knitting across the aisle, I gripped the arm rests.…
Why did this brilliant Irish artist fall off the radar?
Sir John Lavery has always had a place in Irish affections. His depiction of his wife, Hazel, as the mythical…
The miracle of The Miracle Club is that it does, I promise, end
The Miracle Club, which is about a group of Irish women who travel to Lourdes, has a magnificent cast –…
Seamus Heaney’s letters confirm that he really was as nice as he seemed
Seamus Heaney’s letters are full of energy and joie de vivre, but a darker note persists as the pressure of celebrity grows, says Roy Foster
Small but perfect: So Late in the Day by Claire Keegan reviewed
The author once takes a big issue and, with her characteristic quiet brilliance, illuminates it in a small homely setting
