I often pass this kitsch masterpiece on Parnell st as I walk to work.

Cracking new book by a former undergrad of ours @historytcd.bsky.social, Shane Lynn, on global Irish nationalism and the South African war. Published by the excellent Irish diaspora series @gihnyu.bsky.social. Beautifully written.

Olusegun is a Visiting Research Fellow with us @historytcd.bsky.social and he is giving a talk for Africa day @ria.ie on the long history of African Studies in Ireland. 26th May 2025 at 1.30-4pm. Looks great, and all are welcome.

How lovely. When I first came to work at Trinity the college didn’t allow the students to lounge around on the grass like this. That was a bit silly, wasn’t it.

Next week, through the magic of the internet, I'll appear simultaneously at the Uni of Texas (Austin) as part of their Second Books Series, at 11am local time, and at 5pm Irish time. I'll talk about my new book, and I'll also talk about the (sometimes tortuous) process of writing it. Join us!

Greatly enjoying reading the fruits of Walter Guinness’s late career ‘gap yah’ cruising around the Atlantic looking for ‘pure blood Eskimos’, ‘collecting’ cultural artefacts, and capturing exotic animals. When you are a very rich, very bored gazillionaire you can do this sort of thing.

A bittersweet feeling receiving this beautiful book, edited by @fionnualawalsh.bsky.social. The contributors were asked by the late David Fitzpatrick to complete a companion vol for his project on the Americanisation of Ireland, so it is a second goodbye to a brilliant colleague. One for the guild.

Many thanks to the Irish Times for reviewing my recent book. We’re lucky that a national newspaper makes space for academic books in their review pages.

Power and Powerlessness in Union Ireland

www.irishtimes.com/culture/book...

Library link: academic.oup.com/book/58980

My colleague @speakerconolly.bsky.social dug up some newspaper coverage of it. Content warning for racial slurs.

The Reappraisals in Irish History series I edit for LUP (with Enda Delaney and Maria Luddy) has now produced 21 brilliant volumes on modern Irish history and culture since 2012. We offer ECR authors a little extra in the way of review and support and hope that it pays dividends for them in the end.

8/ Lady Dover had herself been widowed 10 years previously and had two teenage boys of her own, but this was where the comparison ended between herself and Peggy. Lady Dover had married George Agar-Ellis,who owned 5,000 acres in Northampton and another 1,100 in Oxford.

6/ On Saturday, January 7, 1843, a tall young woman in a blue cloak appeared at Lambeth Police Court in London, attracting the attention of the court reporters. Peggy Keating, a widow, had been evicted from her four-acre dwelling in Kilkenny by an agent acting for her absentee landlady, Lady Dover.

5/ The book opens with the military road, bisecting the Wicklow mountains, and it ends with a bunch of fishermen complaining about the collapsing price of lobsters post-independence. Let me focus on just one story of many: that of Peggy Keating.

My book Power and Powerlessness in Union Ireland: Life in a Palliative State (OUP, 2024) was just published online. It is ludicrously expensive, so let me explain the basic premise of the book. If interested, please encourage your local/univ library to buy a copy. academic.oup.com/book/58980
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Needed to rethink a lecture on race in modern Ireland this term and these are some of the books that helped me enormously. It’s a really vibrant area at the moment.