Death of Brian Patten
Sorry to hear of the death of the Liverpool poet Brian Patten. I first met Brian in 1997. I’d been invited to a friend’s wedding in Valencia but a few days before the wedding the venue had been moved to Mojácar. The groom, my friend Tim O’Grady, because of the change...
BLESS ME FATHER
Former IRA prisoner Pat Magee reviews the recently published and highly-acclaimed memoir, Bless Me Father—A Life Story by the singer/songwriter, Kevin Rowland. -oo0oo- The Royal Festival Hall, Southbank Centre, London, 29 April 2016. I’m attending Imagining Ireland,...
ALL THE DEAD VOICES
My updated memoir, All The Dead Voices, was launched last Friday, 1 August, in the courtyard of Glór na Móna, Ballymurphy, in front of an audience of about one hundred people. The event—part of Féile an Phobail—was chaired by veteran republican Liam Stone. One of the...
NORAID: Irish America and the IRA
Ciaran Quinn, Sinn Féin Representative to North America, here reviews the RTÉ documentary, NORAID: Irish America and the IRA. The first part was broadcast last Wednesday and the final episode goes out tonight at 21.25. Both can also be viewed now on the RTÉ Player....
The White Bear
My review of The White Bear by Henrik Pontoppidan, translated by Paul Larkin, was published in today's Irish Examiner (21 June, 2025). Here is the review: The novels and short stories of Pontoppidan, who won the Nobel Prize for Literature in 1917, reflect Danish...
What is ‘Say Nothing’ for?
The Irish-American writer Tim O’Grady recently wrote a review for the website of the current affairs magazine, Byline, which was also published by the Belfast Media Group and the Andersonstown News. His review was a forensic analysis of the television series, Say...
‘A Spiritual Act, A Holy Deed’
I wrote this tribute to Native American Indian Leonard Peltier in 2003 as he entered his twenty-eighth year of imprisonment. I included the feature in my 2004 book, Rebel Columns, and sent Leonard a signed copy with a personalised dedication but the prison authorities...
A man of immense peace and ease
Martin Neary’s book, Madogue Memories, about his life in east Mayo, the perennial toil of maintaining the land, his having to seek work in England to support his small holding, is told with great humility and charm but with a certain melancholia. In his evocative...
O’Casey Revisited
An abbreviated version of this feature has already appeared online but this is a much fuller piece by the Galway-based lecturer and writer, Jenny Farrell, who is also an Associate Editor of Culture Matters. The sixtieth anniversary of Seán O’Casey’s death fell on 18...
Powerful Collection
Just read More Tales About Life, Love & Death by Paul Marauder, a collection of poems and flash fiction dedicated to the struggle of the Palestinian people and their suffering in Gaza. The writing is potent, visceral and personal, often in the first-person, and...