Bringing the World to You! Ireland: Food & Culture

From an analysis of the Guinness brand's reflection of Irish identity to an exploration of murals and film portrayals of political prisoners, this pioneering collection of essays seeks to present Ireland's relationship to visual culture as a whole. While other works have explored the imagistic history of Ireland, most have restricted their lens to a single form of visual representation. Ireland in Focus is the first book to address the diverse range of visual representations of national and communal identity in Ireland.

The castles of Ireland are an essential part of the story of medieval Europe, but were, until recently, a subject neglected by scholars. A lord's power and prestige was displayed in the majesty and uniqueness of his castle. The remains of several thousand castles enable us to reconstruct life in Ireland during these crucial centuries. Castles in Ireland tells the story of the nature and development of lordship and power in medieval Ireland.

For many people step dancing is associated mainly with the Irish step-dance stage shows, Riverdance and Lord of the Dance, which assisted both in promoting the dance form and in placing Ireland globally. But, in this book, Catherine Foley illustrates that the practice and contexts of step dancing are much more complicated and fluid. Tracing the trajectory of step dancing in Ireland, she tells its story from roots in eighteenth-century Ireland to its diverse cultural manifestations today.

Fintan Vallely, himself an accomplished musician and music writer, has harnessed the expertise of more than two hundred specialists from various aspects of traditional music, who present a remarkably comprehensive image of the field. The Companion presents A-Z descriptions of instruments and their playing styles, repertoires, the history of traditions, and analysis of the impact of the media and the modern history of traditional music making.

Oscar Wilde, W.B. Yeats, James Joyce, and Samuel Beckett: These four masters of Irish literature created works of startling innovation and unparalleled literary merit. They defied popular expectations and confounded critics with unique masterpieces that one might think of as puzzles, the solution of which lies at the heart of the modern age. Understanding the works of these greats, all associated to some degree with the Irish Literary Revival, is fundamental not only to a richer appreciation of Irish literature, but to a better comprehension of modern literature in all its manifestations, for these authors struggled with the idea of modernity and all it entailed, and the fruits of their struggle stand as monuments to the remarkable capacity of literary imagination. Renowned professor George O'Brien of Georgetown University provides the biographical background of these authors and an in-depth analysis of their greatest works. In the course of these lectures, O'Brien discusses the very qualities that set these works apart and the "Irishness" that characterizes each of them.

How did an Irish schoolboy become the lead singer of a world-famous rock band and the founder of several humanitarian groups' Track Bono's rise to fame in this exciting addition to the Who Was' series. By age 16, Paul David Hewson was such a good singer that he had earned the nickname "Bono Vox," a Latin phrase that translates to "good voice." When he became the frontman of the newly formed rock band U2 in 1976, he adopted part of the nickname and "Bono" was introduced to the world.

From her first appearances on the stage and screen, Maureen O'Hara (b. 1920) commanded attention with her striking beauty, radiant red hair, and impassioned portrayals of spirited heroines. Whether she was being rescued from the gallows by Charles Laughton ( The Hunchback of Notre Dame, 1939), falling in love with Walter Pidgeon against a coal-blackened sky ( How Green Was My Valley, 1941), learning to believe in miracles with Natalie Wood ( Miracle on 34th Street, 1947), or matching wits with John Wayne ( The Quiet Man, 1952), she charmed audiences with her powerful presence and easy confidence. Maureen O'Hara is the first book-length biography of the screen legend hailed as the "Queen of Technicolor." Following the star from her childhood in Dublin to the height of fame in Hollywood, film critic Aubrey Malone draws on new information from the Irish Film Institute, production notes from films, and details from historical film journals, newspapers, and fan magazines.

Writer Samuel Beckett (1906-89) is known for depicting a world of abject misery, failure, and absurdity in his many plays, novels, short stories, and poetry. Yet the despair in his work is never absolute, instead it is intertwined with black humor and an indomitable will to endure--characteristics best embodied by his most famous characters, Vladimir and Estragon, in the play Waiting for Godot. Beckett himself was a supremely modern, minimalist writer who deeply distrusted biographies and resisted letting himself be pigeonholed by easy interpretation or single definition. Andrew Gibson's accessible critical biography overcomes Beckett's reticence and carefully considers the writer's work in relation to the historical circumstances of his life.

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In The Country Cooking of Ireland, internationally acclaimed food and travel writer Colman Andrews brings to life the people, countryside, and delicious food of Ireland. Fast emerging as one of the world's hottest culinary destinations, Ireland is a country of artisanal bakers, farmers, cheese makers, and butteries, where farm-to-table dining has been practiced for centuries. Meticulously researched and reported, this sumptuous cookbook includes 250 recipes and more than 100 photographs of the pubs, the people, and the emerald Irish countryside taken by award-winning photographer Christopher Hirsheimer.

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Ready to experience Ireland? The experts at Fodor’s are here to help. Fodor’s Ireland 2020 travel guide is packed with customizable itineraries with top recommendations, detailed maps of Ireland, and exclusive tips from locals. Whether you want to explore Ireland’s iconic coastal scenery, visit the Cliffs of Moher or the Ring of Kerry, or experience Ireland’s thriving arts and music scene, this user-friendly guidebook will help you plan it all out. Our local writers vet every recommendation to ensure that you not only make the most of your time, but that you also have all the most up-to-date and essential information you need to plan the perfect trip.

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Lonely Planet: The world's number one travel guide publisher Whether exploring your own backyard or somewhere new, discover the freedom of the open road with Lonely Planet's Galway & the West of Ireland's BestTrips. Featuring seven amazing road trips, plus up-to-date advice on the destinations you'll visit along the way.

Need to know it all? Our all-inclusive culture report for Ireland will get up to speed on all aspects of culture in Ireland, including lifecycle, religion, women, superstitions & folklore, sports, holidays & festivals, and etiquette.

In 1845, a disaster struck Ireland. Overnight, a mysterious blight attacked the potato crops, turning the potatoes black and destroying the only real food of nearly six million people. Over the next five years, the blight attacked again and again. These years are known today as the Great Irish Famine, a time when one million people died from starvation and disease and two million more fled their homeland.    Black Potatoes is the compelling story of men, women, and children who defied landlords and searched empty fields for scraps of harvested vegetables and edible weeds to eat, who walked several miles each day to hard-labor jobs for meager wages and to reach soup kitchens, and who committed crimes just to be sent to jail, where they were assured of a meal. It's the story of children and adults who suffered from starvation, disease, and the loss of family and friends, as well as those who died. Illustrated with black and white engravings, it's also the story of the heroes among the Irish people and how they held on to hope.

In this book, Patrick Steward and Bryan McGovern present the first holistic, multi-national study of the Fenian movement While utilizing a vast array of previously untapped primary sources, the authors uncover the socio-economic roots of Irish nationalist behavior at the height of the Victorian Period. Concurrently, they trace the progression of Fenian ideals in the grassroots of Young Ireland to its de facto collapse in 1870s. In doing so, the authors change the perception of the Fenians from fanatics who aimlessly attempted to free their homeland to idealists who believed in their cause and fought with a physical and rhetorical force that was not nonsensical and hopeless as some previous accounts have suggested.

Political violence in Northern Ireland began in the late 1960s and has been part of life there and to a lesser extent in the Republic of Ireland and Great Britain for nearly three decades. The crisis has perplexed politicians, strained democratic institutions, and has placed British policies under the microscope of international scrutiny. The volume of up-to-date essays places recent developments in context. It looks at the ideology of republicans and unionists, the impediments to peace, problems of gender and citizenship, the impact of partition on the island's economy, how The Troubles have been filtered through the press, and the impact of overspill violence in the Republic of Ireland and Great Britain.

Based on extensive archival research he Politics of the Irish Civil War situates the Irish civil war in the general process of decolonization in the twentieth century, and explains why divisions over the Anglo-Irish Treaty of 1921 proved so formative in the development of the Irish state. Each chapter is devoted to a particular aspect of the war and many new areas are explored. These include the role the doctrine of self-determination played in the Sinn Fein movement, the fate of numerous peace initiatives, the power struggle between de Valera and Liam Lynch within the IRA, and the impact of the civil war on the wider civil society. The last three chapters explore how the conflict has been interpreted by the actors themselves, as well as by historians.

An accessible and innovative look at Irish history by some of today's most exciting historians of Ireland This book brings together some of today's most exciting scholars of Irish history to chart the pivotal events in the history of modern Ireland while providing fresh perspectives on topics ranging from colonialism and nationalism to political violence, famine, emigration, and feminism. The Princeton History of Modern Ireland takes readers from the Tudor conquest in the sixteenth century to the contemporary boom and bust of the Celtic Tiger, exploring key political developments as well as major social and cultural movements.

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Ireland is inarguably a beautiful, enchanted place. But its history is more turbulent, fascinating, and terrible than any other. From the first English presence in Ireland in the twelfth century, through siege, rebellion, and civil war, to Irish ascendancy, home rule, and the present-day Troubles, bestselling author Paul Johnson tells, with remarkable clarity and concision, the compelling story of this most remarkable island.