Alexis de Tocqueville in Ireland - An Irishman's Diary

I have just written an Irishman's Diary in the Irish Times about the French political thinker, politician and historian, Alexis de Tocqueville (1805-1859), who visited Ireland in 1835. In a six week period between July and August 1835, he traveled over 600 miles and visited several counties including Dublin, Carlow, Waterford, Kilkenny, Cork, Kerry, Clare and Mayo. Read the article here.

Alexis de Tocqueville (1805-1859). Image source.

Tocqueville is known to us today for his important, ground-breaking examination of politics in the United States of America, Democracy in America, but his lesser known writings on Ireland are also worth examining. His first hand account of what he witnessed on his travels around Ireland and of his conversations with all classes of Irish people makes for very interesting reading. An English language translation of Tocqueville's writings on Ireland was published in 1990 - Alexis de Tocqueville's Journey in Ireland, July-August 1835, trans. by Emmet Larkin (Washington D.C.: Catholic University of America Press, 1990).

Ireland was a very interesting destination for European visitors in the early 19th century. They were fascinated by the difference between Ireland and her near neighbour, England, in terms of economy, politics and religion. Tocqueville intended to write a book about Ireland, but it was his friend and travelling companion, Gustave de Beaumont, who later wrote a book about Ireland.

NPHFI Conference 2015 - University College Dublin

The Eighth Annual Conference of the Newspaper and Periodical History Forum of Ireland (NPHFI) took place in the UCD Humanities Institute on Friday 13 and Saturday 14 November 2015.

This year's theme was: 'Reporting Revolution: What the papers said'. Speakers, including academics, journalists and independent scholars, came from Ireland, the UK, Canada, South Africa to present their research. A selection of photographs from the conference can be viewed on the Forum's Facebook page.

I presented a paper on the French journalist and author, Joseph Kessel (1898-1979). Kessel, who visited Dublin, Cork and Belfast during the Irish War of Independence, has been called the French Ernest Hemmingway.

Jules Verne & Ireland - An Irishman's Diary

The French author, Jules Verne (1828-1905), is known to all as the father of science fiction, but did you know that one of his books was set in Ireland?

Page from 1906 edition of P'Tit-Bonhomme. Source: Wikimedia Commons

I have just written an Irishman's Diary in the Irish Times newspaper about a book by Jules Verne, P'Tit-Bonhomme, which tells the incredible rags to riches story of a young Irish orphan, named Mick.

The book has been translated into English as Foundling Mick and A Lad of Grit. It has even been adapted for radio. Maybe it's time for the movie, what do you think?

An Irishman's Diary - George Bernard Shaw and the National Gallery of Ireland

In an Irishman's Diary in today's Irish Times, I talk about a unique case of Irish philanthropy. Link to article. Irish playwright, George Bernard Shaw (1856-1950), was a great fan of the National Gallery of Ireland. He spent many afternoons there as a young man and later credited the institution with having given him an education.

In fact, he was so grateful to the gallery that he left one third of the residual royalties from his estate to them in his will. The money was used to acquire over one hundred pieces of art and in recent years, was used to fund the refurbishment and expansion of the gallery.

Statue of GB Shaw by Prince Paul Troubetzkoy in the National Gallery of Ireland.

The gallery returned the favour by naming the Shaw Room after him. There is also a life size bronze statue of Shaw on display inside the Clare Street entrance. The statue was created in 1927 by Shaw's friend, the Italian sculptor, Prince Paul Troubetzkoy. It used to stand outside the (main) Merrion Square entrance, but was brought inside in recent years. There is some additional information about Shaw's gift  here on the website of the National Gallery of Ireland.

Parnell Summer School 2015

I was invited to speak at the 2015 Parnell Summer School. The theme for this year was 'The French Connection: Ireland and France'. Over five days (9-13 August 2015), speakers from Ireland, UK and the USA discussed the historical and cultural ties between Ireland and France.

The Summer School was officially opened by the French Ambassador to Ireland, HE Jean-Pierre Thébault, on Sunday 9th August. The ambassador spoke about the historic links between the two countries and was greeted by a pipe band who played the two national anthems.

My presentation, entitled "'French Letters' in Irish Newspapers and Periodicals: The Epistolary Form and the Franco-Irish Relationship", was based on newspaper articles written in Paris that appeared in several Irish newspapers in the 19th and 20th centuries. The 'letter' writers that I spoke about included John Mitchel, Michael MacWhite, Stephen Gwynn and Simone Téry.

The Summer School was held in Avondale, Co. Wicklow (pictured above), the ancestral home of Charles Stewart Parnell.

I would like to thank the Parnell Society and the Academic Director of the Summer School, Felix Larkin, for their kind invitation to speak at the Summer School. Link to the 2015 Parnell Summer School programme.

An Irishman's Diary - Pioneering French Journalist Albert Londres

Albert Londres (1884-1932) is often held up as the prototype for the grand reporter journalist in France. He was born in Vichy in 1884 and came to prominence when he reported about the destruction of Reims Cathedral in Le Matin in 1914. 

Londres traveled all over the world uncovering wrongdoing on the part of the state and writing about it in the press. In memory of Londres, the Prix Albert Londres is awarded to the best reporter in the written press every year. Read my Irishman's Diary about Albert Londres in the Irish Times.

Image source: https://commons.wikimedia.org/wiki/File:Albert_Londres_en_1923.jpg

An Irishman's Diary - A Corkman's Philanthropy

I have just written another Irishman's Diary article in the Irish Times. Read it here. It tells the story of a donation that Joseph Stafford Gibson made in 1919 to the Cork Municipal School of Art (now Crawford Art Gallery). Through Gibson's kind bequest, the gallery was able to acquire many fine works of art, including paintings, drawings, sketches and sculpture by Irish as well as other artists.

The bequest also allowed students to travel abroad to add to their knowledge and understanding of art. Over the years, artists such as Kathleen Murphy-O'Connor (Paris 1924), Seamus Murphy (Paris 1931/2), John O'Leary (Paris 1957) and Pat Murray (Bayreuth 1966)  were awarded a Gibson Bequest Scholarship that enabled them to travel to Europe to hone their artistic skills. Link to a web page about the Gibson Bequest on the Crawford Gallery's website.

Photograph of the Crawford Art Gallery

These days, the most prominent collection on display in the gallery is the AIB Art Collection. It's an amazing tour de force of some of the best artists produced in Ireland in recent times including Mainie Jellett, Mary Swanzy, Jack B. Yeats, Sean Keating, Harry Kernoff, Paul and Grace Henry, Colin Middleton, Roderic O'Conor, Aloysius O'Kelly and John Lavery. In other words - well worth a visit...

Photograph of plaque on side of display cabinet housing items donated to the Crawford Art Gallery by Joseph Stafford Gibson.

Bequests and donations are very important to galleries and museums as they provide a fresh source of funds to keep them relevant and competitive. In the National Gallery of Ireland for example, there are several important bequests that have helped the gallery acquire art works. The Shaw Fund (George Bernard Shaw), the Lane Fund (Sir Hugh Lane) and the Vaughan Bequest (Henry Vaughan [Turner watercolours]). Link here to the gallery's web page on bequests. More information here on bequests from Apollo Magazine.

An Irishman's Diary - Friedrich Engels and Ireland

I have just written an Irishman's Diary entry in the Irish Times. It is available to read here. It tells the story of the connection between the co-author of The Communist Manifesto, Friedrich Engels and Ireland.

It seems that the German philosopher and political theorist became a little obsessed with Ireland after he met Mary Burns, who was of Irish extraction, in Manchester. He visited Ireland twice during his lifetime and planned to write a history of the country. He even learned Irish to be able to study its history. Sadly, he never managed it, as he died before it could be completed.

Friedrich Engels in 1856. Image source: https://commons.wikimedia.org/wiki/File:Engels_1856.jpg

Irish Times online article and podcast on flâneurs & Ireland.

Photograph of Henri Béraud (1885-1958). Image source: Wikimedia Commons

I have just written a short online article on flâneurs and Ireland for the Irish Times. You can read it here. The article stems from the chapter I wrote on Henri Béraud's time in Ireland in the book The Flâneur Abroad: Historical and International Perspectives (Newcastle upon Tyne: Cambridge Scholars Publishing, 2014).

A podcast of a discussion on flâneurs and Ireland with me, Fionn Davenport and Hugh Linehan of the Irish Times is available here (from 31 mins).

Link to the publisher's website. A sample from the book, including table of contents and introduction, is available here.

My chapter in book "The Flâneur Abroad: Historical and International Perspectives"

Have you ever heard the word flâneur? These are some commonly used definitions:

* "an idle man-about-town" Merriam Webster Dictionary

* "an idler or loafer" Collins Dictionary

* "a man who saunters around observing society" Oxford Dictionaries

A new book - "The Flâneur Abroad: Historical and International Perspectives" (Newcastle upon Tyne: Cambridge Scholars Publishing, 2014) exploring the world of the flâneur and flânerie has just been published. Link to the publishers website. The book developed from a conference of the same name held at the University of Nottingham in England in July 2012. The conference was organised by Prof Richard Wrigley of the Department of Art History at that university.

The book contains sixteen chapters which examine various types of flâneur in various locations around the world. My chapter 'Henri Béraud's Flâneur Salarié Abroad in Ireland' looks at an unusual type of flâneur who visited Ireland, an unusual destination for this mythic character, who is more usually associated with the great European cities of London and Paris.

The flâneur is a curious type of character who sprang to consciousness in the 19th century through the work of writers such as Charles Baudelaire. Below is a page from the book Physiologie du Flâneur by the French journalist, Louis Huart. Illustrations are by three celebrated illustrators, Marie-Alexandre Adolphe, Honoré Daumier and Théodore Maurisset. This image is taken from Gallica, the digital library of the Bibliothèque nationale de France. Link http://gallica.bnf.fr/ark:/12148/btv1b8530312c/f10.image The book is also available to view on The Internet Archive https://archive.org/details/physiologiedufla00huar