This Human Season

Book Description

November 1979, the height of Northern Ireland’s Troubles. Kathleen Moran’s son Sean has just been transferred to the hypersecure H-block in Belfast’s notorious Maze prison, where he soon emerges as a young but important force in the extreme protest, known as the Blanket, that political prisoners are staging there. John Dunn is also newly arrived at the prison, having taken on the job of guard—a brutal but effective way to support a house and a girlfriend, the domestic dream.

In the weeks leading up to Christmas, no one’s dreams go untroubled. As rumors of a hunger strike begin to circulate, Louise Dean’s pitch-perfect novel places two parents, two sons, and two enemies on a collision course that ends in a surprising and deeply resonant climax.

Customer Reviews:

point counterpoint.......2007-04-02

Each chapter are the gut wrenching experiences of those living in Northern ireland during The troubles. Insight into the actual day to day lives of the Provos, the Republicans and the Unionists causes the reader to pause and consider present day world wide conflicts. A great book to suggest to a book club. Great and noursihing food for thought. The only down side is that the complexity of the sentances sometimes loose the reader

"You're already involved, aren't you, just by living here; so you might as well try and do something about it.".......2007-03-28

Set in Belfast, this novel by Louise Dean focuses on the sectarian violence between Republicans and Loyalists, Catholics and Protestants, which reaches its irrational peak in the winter of 1979, and she holds back nothing in describing the brutality and tit-for-tat horrors in which both sides engage. For three years, a major protest has been going on inside The Maze, the famed prison in Long Kesh, where sadistic guards turn the miseries of prison life into horrific, inhuman conditions. In an almost clinical recitation of scenes so gross that many readers will prefer not to read them, she describes conditions, which prisoners have deliberately made worse. They refuse to wear prison uniforms, wearing no clothes at all and wrapping themselves in their blankets. They refuse to use latrines, filling their cells and halls with excrement and creating a stench so intense that guards cannot scrub it off their bodies.

Desperate for public attention for their modest demands, which have been ignored, they are about to engage in a hunger strike, the pivotal event for the action here. Putting a human face on the turmoil, the novel focuses on two families--the Morans, whose teenage son Sean has been sentenced to sixteen years at Long Kesh, and John Dunn, a 39-year-old former British soldier who has just started work as a guard. Dunn has recently connected with the British son he never knew, born out of wedlock, a young man about the same age as Sean Moran. Dean uses parallel scenes (most touchingly, at Christmas) to show how much, on the human level, these two families have in common.

Dean illustrates the conditions and the thinking of the time as the minimal plot unfolds. Kathleen Moran, Sean's mother, becomes involved with the Relatives Action Committee. Their local priest is at odds with some other priests because he supports the hunger strike and protest. Sinn Fein is represented both inside and outside the prison, and one prisoner, who maintains IRA control within the prison, also directs retaliatory murders on guards outside the prison, in their own homes or neighborhoods.

Historical events are paramount, more than just a framework for the novel, and the reader develops a sense of horror about these events. There is little sense of identification with characters, however. The hard-case attitudes of the prisoners allow little room for character development, and the many guards, while having individual quirks, are not well differentiated. The character who comes closest to capturing the reader's interest is Dunn, but the author creates such obvious forboding about his fate and that of the other guards that many readers will be wary of becoming involved. Though the characters here are vehicles through whom information is conveyed, rather than a focus of the novel for their own sakes, Dean creates a powerful picture of seminal events--certain to interest many students of Irish history. n Mary Whipple

(4.5) "It is not those who can inflict the most but those who can suffer the most who will conquer.".......2007-02-03

This wonderfully-crafted novel addresses the surreal contrast between the warring factions in 1979 Belfast, Catholics battered by years of violence in the name of the cause, the Brits reacting with determined force, barging into rebel homes in search of contraband. All is writ in the language of occupation, one side fighting for a united Ireland, the other imposing English law, families caught in the middle, their loyalty unassailable, their children learning of war instead of the easy camaraderie of childhood. Sean Moran has been arrested in the death of an English soldier, sent to Belfast's Maze Prison, where he "takes the blanket", joining a group of rebels who refuse to wear prison clothing and paint the walls of their cells with excrement.

Kate Moran is reeling from her oldest son's incarceration, the entire family charged with anxiety as British soldiers rampage through their home searching for weapons. Kate's husband, the senior Sean, continues to hide in the comfort of the bottle, rehashing his old war stories, proud that his son is a soldier for the cause. In contrast to this family caught in the grinding jaws of cycling violence, Englishman John Dunn reports daily to the Maze, plodding through foul-smelling shifts where the other guards survive by fortifying themselves with drink. Stunned by the cavalier brutality and lack of discipline around him, John is carefully watched by his fellow guards for weakness or signs of empathy with the enemy, working long, depressing hours, his home life suffering from lack of attention. An "us or them" mentality prevails, the Maze a black hole of bare subsistence, the incarcerated rebels determined to change their status from criminals to prisoners of war.

The result is pure bedlam, the beliefs of each faction polarizing and demeaning to all, the guards lurking in the same filthy hell as their prisoners: "The moment you've put on that uniform on, you are a target." Finally, For Dunn, hope appears in the person of his son Mark, born of a casual acquaintance years earlier. It is John's connection with this young man that pulls him from the depressing tedium of his job, offering an opportunity to experience the rewards of fatherhood. Against an implacable foe with no end in sight, the Moran's play out their drama, trapped by the circumstances of time and place. Simultaneously, John Dunn lives his personal nightmare as a prison guard, his life threatened, family dynamic in constant flux.

Through the two households, Dean explores the effects of long-term conflict and the damage done to the social fabric of a warring city, each side locked into preordained battle lines. It is the inevitability of violence that defines Belfast in 1979, with no room for negotiation, the citizens traumatized by a harsh existence with few rewards. The contrast between the two sides is striking, immutable, a long struggle cast in black and white. The crux: "You can't change anyone's mind by killing them." The essence of this dilemma is beautifully captured in the characters that people this powerful novel, a human season, "this springtime of hatred." Luan Gaines/2007.

Northern Irish life in led in & out of prison, late 1979.......2006-03-21

A friend from Ballymurphy recommended this to me, a novel that takes place around Christmas 1979 as seen through two characters who never meet: Kathleen Moran, a West Belfast mother, wife, and weary at the age of 40, with one son contemplating the looming choice to go on hunger strike in Long Kesh prison. There, guard John Dunn, a veteran of the British Army who has already done three tours in the North of Ireland, decides to work for the increased pay given for such hazardous duty, not only on the inside, but as a target outside the walls from both embittered Loyalists as well as hostile Republicans.

Dean tells these two tales well. She avoids cliche, does not show off an overly literary style, preferring to keep more inside, via indirect narration, the perspectives largely limited to Kathleen and John. As the novel progresses, we begin to see more about their partners, their pasts, their relatives, and the reasons they both choose to endure the North rather than flee for less embattled, more leisurely, climes. The alternation, every chapter, of their two stories helps avoid melodrama or predictability. By no means a "Troubles thriller" or a hackneyed hand-wringing liberal plaint, the author--as her acknowledgments show in the appendix, has by interviewing and listening to the real people who lived through this time been able to mix their experiences into fiction that passes for fact, as limited to two frail people recognizably very human.

While I in turn recommend this book, a few very minor points prevented it from earning a full five stars. Twice the names of Cardinal O Fiach and the first name of Eamon[n] are misspelled--this shows a shortsighted editor; the misspelling of the area of Twinbrook, again a miniscule slip, again makes me wish a bit more attention had been paid to such telling details so that they rang as true as possible. Some of the supporting characters, such as Lingard's wife, the priest Father Pearse, Brendan the Sinn Fein publicist, and O'Malley the IRA OC, perhaps based on real folks, do not always share the same depth as the main characters, and therefore leave the reader a bit let down. Finally, there is what seems to be a half-visible subplot about Loyalists having been attacked by the guards and the resulting backlash from those on the outside against John and his colleagues that remains too vaguely developed.

In closing, this book effectively avoids what I thought would be the pat ending, and Dean, nearly to the conclusion, manages to freshen up what has by now decades on become its own often all too predictable genre of British literature. The pace does weary just short of the finish line. Yet, the two leading characters, by their refusal to become either plaster saints or evil figurines, earn the reader's trust and empathy.

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Another story about the "troubles"

Pray for Us Sinners
Patrick Taylor
Manufacturer: Insomniac Press
ProductGroup: Book
Binding: Paperback

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ASIN: 1895837618

Book Description

A fast-paced thriller about a British explosives expert who goes on a dangerous undercover mission in the IRA.

Customer Reviews:

Another story about the "troubles".......2001-09-10

I have read a number of books about the conflict in Northern Irleand, some fiction, some not. The best story I have read is "Field of Blood" by Gerald Seymour. However "Prya for Us Sinners" is a realistic protrayal of the devious ways all parties to the conflict operate. It is a short novel, and quickly read. The author shows that there are really no "good guys" in this battle, and trust is not something you can count on.

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a piece of real journalism
Great read
An indispensable account...
Necessary Read for the American Audience
The Dark Side of Ulster

Belfast Diary: War as a Way of Life
John Conroy
Manufacturer: Beacon Press
ProductGroup: Book
Binding: Paperback

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ASIN: 0807002178

Book Description

A street-level view of the twenty-five-year conflict in Northern Ireland. "For those puzzled by Northern Ireland, Belfast Diary offers a wellwritten, sympathetic and cleareyed view."

-The New York Times Book Review

Customer Reviews:

a piece of real journalism.......2005-10-14

Conroy rolls around in the grit and dirt of life in sectarian violence-shattered Belfast.
Everythings here-the horror stories,police violence, IRA knee-cappings, the tragic tales of getting involved with paramilitary groups, but what is most haunting is just how shatterd everyday life has become for everyone from Sandy Row to Shankhill.
I wouldn't call Conroy pro-Catholic or pro-nationalist be he does de-BBCize his storytelling for the reader giving them a look into the society and goings on of that large minority.
Conroy.
What the reader is ultimately left with is valuabe albiet painful insight into Western Europe's longest (and dirtiest) civil from an outsider's eye-witness view

Great read.......2004-05-10

I really enjoyed this book. I thought that Conroy did a great job putting the 'Troubles' in Belfast into perspective from an American living in the midst of it all. Having visted the area that he writes of brought back memories. I referred to his map at least 50 times during my reading of the book to recall the streets that I walked in relation to where he wrote the book and spent his time in Belfast. I highly recommend this book.

An indispensable account..........2003-08-27

of what it is like to live, work and experience the turmoil of "The Troubles." Conroy covered the Troubles the right way...he went in and lived among the people in Belfast instead of swooping in for drive-by interviews like too many journalists have done in the past. He also manages to convey what he experienced while maintaining objectivity...this skill when dealing with terrorist and paramilitary violence is something writers covering the "War on Terror" these days could learn from. Required reading for anybody interested in Northern Ireland, its history and how to possibly make a better future in that wartorn nation...

Necessary Read for the American Audience.......2003-06-19

This book was recommended to me as excellent reading about the Troubles, particularly for Americans. I whole-heartedly agree; it is all that and more. Conroy does describe the daily workings of life in Northern Ireland but he also tackles the prejudices and ignorance of Americans (and the U.S. government) when it comes to the political climate in Northern Ireland. He pulls no punches and sugar-coats no issues. He explicates the situation as he sees it and is not afraid to indict those who turn blind eyes. The version I read was older so I have not yet seen the updated book that includes information on semi-recent IRA ceasefires. But I do think many of Conroy's observations are still applicable, changes in administration notwithstanding. He describes the intolerant view towards Sinn Fein taken by the American government in the 80s and the biased, oversimplified treatment of the Troubles by the American media. Indeed as Conroy notes it has not been hard to sell the British point-of-view to American audiences but what of the counterpoint? When do proponents of the other side get a chance? Conroy also concludes that for as long as Northern Ireland remains a British enclave, continued violence is guaranteed. For that reason alone, Americans owe it to themselves to read _Belfast Diary_.

The Dark Side of Ulster.......2003-02-19

My wife and I returned from a trip to Northern Ireland in SEP02 and purchased a copy of Belfast Diary. Simply, Belfast Diary is a book about a journalist from Chicago who rents a room in a home in Belfast to learn more about the Troubles. As mentioned by the other people who submitted reviews about this book, I couldn't put it down. However, I couldn't give this book five stars because I thought it painted a picture of the Troubles as seen from one side of the street. The author traveled to Belfast from Chicago (where each year they turn the river green on St. Patrick's Day), he worked on this book in a rented room in a home located in a Catholic section of Belfast, and he mentions that he is married to a Catholic woman from Northern Ireland. In my opinion, this book would have been much better had it been balanced. There are two sides to every conflict.

Thankfully a lot has changed in Belfast since Mr. Conroy wrote this book about what he experienced while living in the British province. Things have clearly changed for Ulster, which has become one of the up and coming destinations for tourists (as mentioned in Travel Weekly magazine in FEB03). A trip to Northern Ireland is a fascinating educational experience.

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Cal, a highly recommended book. READ IT!!

Cal!

Simple but elegant.....

A Brutal Tale

The story about a young man in Northern Ireland

Cal
Bernard MacLaverty
Manufacturer: W. W. Norton & Company
ProductGroup: Book
Binding: Paperback

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ASIN: 0393313328

Amazon.com

First published in 1983, this lyrical novel, superficially straightforward but full of stories within stories, first brought Bernard MacLaverty's work to public attention. In the novel, a young Irish Republican Army operative who wants to break the cycle of violence seeks out a woman whose Ulster policeman husband he helped to murder. As their relationship grows, so do Cal's guilt and sorrow, until, in the end, he is forced to make a sacrifice of himself in order to gain redemption. Rich in ideas and history, this book helps us understand the situation in Northern Ireland--which "is not just there," MacLaverty has remarked, "as a colorful background."

Customer Reviews:

Cal, a highly recommended book. READ IT!!.......2002-01-31

First of all, we used about one month reading it. It was a part of this years curriculum. "Cal" consists of a very heavy English language, so if your vocabulary is small, we're not sure if we would recommend it.
But the contents itself were really interesting, surprising and you'll get so involved that you can't lay the book down. You'll become a "readaholic."
The plot involves in Ireland in the late 70's. Cal is the main character, with Marcella, Shamie, Crilly, Skeffington, the Mortons and Dunlop as the other characters.
Cal is a boy in his early twenty's. He lives with his father, Shamie, in a house in a nameless town. The problem is that Cal and his father is Catholics, a hated religion in the protestant town.
Cal gets beaten up and "hanged out" because of his religion.
Cal's "friends," Crilly and Skeffington makes money in a criminal way. They also take part in the I.R.A (Irish Republican Army). Cal hears the name "Marcella somewhere, and remembers something about it. (This is the part when you're supposed to get the picture the things that has happened, some kind of turning point really) He cant remember what, but he is pretty sure that it wasn't a nice thing. He keeps meeting her, and soon remembers what he did......??? We wont tell what.
He eventually starts to work for Marcella's mother in law, and they develop their relationship.

In a few words; Cal is a book full of tension, sex, violence and other cool stuff. And you'll get an insight into the circumstances in Northern Ireland. You cant really imagine the violence and hate that the people had and still have to live with.

Cal!.......2002-01-17

It was an interesting book, full of tension, violence, crimes, relationships and sex. Very Hard read for a norwegian boy, and I almost made it!!

Simple but elegant............2001-06-29

I've had this book on my shelves for almost fifteen years, if you can believe it, but never got around to reading it until this week. Now I can't figure out why it took me so long to open it.

"Cal" describes the "troubles" in Northern Ireland in a simple yet elegant manner, with a bare minimum of explicit violence and gore. Most of the violence is implied - the two exceptions being the story of how Marcella Morton became a widow, and what at first glance seems to be a rather pointless episode concerning a land mine and a cow. It seemed pointless, that is, until you read further and discovered exactly how the land mine came to be there.

While the violence is at a minimum, the thoughts, feelings, and philosophies of each side are explored quite thoroughly for such a small book. And while I personally found both points of view quite repellent, I will say that I believed that the characters in this book had these beliefs, and that they were extremely passionate regarding them.

The book is also an interesting psychological study, at least as far as Cal McCluskey (the main character) is concerned. With the help of Marcella, the woman he comes to love, it seems that he is growing up, and coming to realize that there's a lot more out in the world than just Catholics & Protestants fighting and killing each other - but his past will ultimately work against him and nullify all the good that Marcella has done for him - because he was the driver of the car containing the man that killed her husband.

A touching, sad, and very important book.

A Brutal Tale.......2001-02-14

Bernard MacLaverty's Cal is perhaps on of the saddest books of the last 20 years. The story of a young Catholic man in Northern Ireland, it slowly but surely tears your heart out.

Cal is an unemployed young man who has very tenuous ties to the IRA. He begins to fall for the widow of one of his group's victims as he tries to break free from the IRA's clutches. All the while he is forced to bear the prejudices of his Protestant neighbors.

MacLaverty skillfully writes the tale. He never fools you about how the story will end but none the less he manages to make the reader invest some emotion in Cal so that when the inevitable comes you are just wiped out.

This is a wonderful piece of modern Irish literature.

The story about a young man in Northern Ireland.......2000-08-10

I confess I didn't know very much about the conflict in Northern Ireland a few weeks ago. "The Catholics built the I.R.A. to drive away the Protestants and to unite Northern Ireland with the catholic Republic of Ireland." That's virtually all I could say about the difficulties in that region of the world. Then, at school, I got this book. I considered it as my chance to learn more about Irish people, their culture and to get a more detailed answer to the question why there was so much blood-shedding in the last decades. Let me tell you if this book gave me the answers I wanted to obtain.

I was quite intrigued by the story of "Cal". An unemployed young Irish Catholic, who has a strong connection to the I.R.A. and who wants to leave it because he doesn't have the guts to commit crimes in the name of an illusion called United Ireland, falls in love with a widow named Marcella. Cal knows from the first moment he saw her that he helped making her a widow, and he realizes that their relationship can't possibly work out for a long time. It was quite interesting to see Cal's change from a depressive youth to a man who is able to take the responsibility for his deeds. He constantly fights against his past and, at the end, although he suffers to relieve himself from his sins, he loses everything. The reader can really identify himself with Cal and understand his behavior. In this point, the author did something you will not find everywhere. But unfortunately he made some mistakes as well...

The novel is called "Cal". The title alone shows the reader that the story is completely fixed on the young man. Apart from Marcella who was discribed in as many dimensions as Cal, all other "dramatis personae" seemed to be parts of the stage and had no life in them. The majority of them was characterized in a very shallow way, and they had the only function to show us in a too simple way the life and the problems of Northern Ireland. Crilly and Skeffington, the terrorists, particularly disappointed me. They were the shallowest and the most cliche-like of all of those background people. I expected more of them because they played such an important role in the story.

Another disappointment was the ending of "Cal". Reading it, I got the strong feeling that the author became bored by his work and wanted to finish it at all costs. The ending was constructed too obviously and appeared unbelievable compared to the rest of the novel.

There are many symbols and metaphors inside "Cal". Both make the book a bigger challenge to understand. What I missed was a trial to explain the conflict and controversial possibilities to solve it. MacLaverty seems to see the happenings in a rather pessimistic way without any thoughts concerning their origins. If something of this kind was there, it seemed to be quite vague and too simplified.

Book Description

This book, the first feminist ethnography of the violence in Northern Ireland, is an analysis of a political conflict through the lens of gender. The case in point is the working-class Catholic resistance to British rule in Northern Ireland. During the 1970s women in Catholic/nationalist districts of Belfast organized themselves into street committees and led popular forms of resistance against the policies of the government of Northern Ireland and, after its demise, against those of the British. In the abundant literature on the conflict, however, the political tactics of nationalist women have passed virtually unnoticed. Begoña Aretxaga argues here that these hitherto invisible practices were an integral part of the social dynamic of the conflict and had important implications for the broader organization of nationalist forms of resistance and gender relationships.

Combining interpretative anthropology and poststructuralist feminist theory, Aretxaga contributes not only to anthropology and feminist studies but also to research on ethnic and social conflict by showing the gendered constitution of political violence. She goes further than asserting that violence affects men and women differently by arguing that the manners in which violence is gendered are not fixed but constantly shifting, depending on the contingencies of history, social class, and ethnic identity. Thus any attempt at subverting gender inequality is necessarily colored by other dimensions of political experience.

Customer Reviews:

Mnà na hEireann.......2001-02-05

When discussing the troubles in Northern Ireland, women are seldom mentioned at all. And when they are mentioned, mostly they are depicted as passive victims of a male-dominated war waged in a male-dominated society. This is often the case, but not a reason in itself to deny or underestimate women's contribution to political and social development in Ulster. Begona Aretxaga's book, born from the author's "prima facie" experience during a 15 months stay in West Belfast (plus several other visits in loco), is a successful attempt to analyse the role of women in Nationalist/Republican struggle. The author makes excellent use of anthropological and ethnographic categories in order to stress the importance of West Belfast women in contributing to the strategies of Irish Republicanism and the creation of Irish Nationalist identity. Although cast in an environment which tends to limit their participation to social life according to traditional values, Nationalist women often succeeded in breaking socially determined barriers. In doing so they contributed to Irish history more than is generally recognized. Moreover, the author's feminist approach, far from being a limit to her analysis, is an effective intellectual tool and succeeds in bringing to the fore a perspective on Irish troubles too often overlooked by many.

Very interesting.......2000-04-13

As a strong reader with a great interest in the "Troubles", I've read many books, by T. P. Coogan, P. Taylor, M. Dillon and others. I found most of them very interesting, but I was amazed by the overwhelming "shattering silence" about women. For instance, in 519 pages of Coogan's "The Troubles", one of the most important IRA women, Mairead Farrell, well known far beyond the Irish borders, gets only 11 lines.

While I was reading these books I wondered why the writers seemed so little interested in highlighting the actual women's role in the "war". In their researches women are seen and interviewed (when they are interviewed)just as mothers, wives, sisters, never as women with their own life, stories, experiences, dreams, their own struggle or political involvement.

Begona Aretxaga gives us a convincing answer about the roots and the meaning of this silence. She fills the gap between the Myth of Mother Ireland and the real life of the real women in the North, and, in so doing, she offers an excellent contribution in women studies in Ireland, beyond the stereotypes that sometimes affect mainstreaming feminism. But she also offers a helpful key to understand the "Truobles" as a whole. Her arguing about "the parallel between the struggle of republican women for recognition and voice within the republican movement, and the struggle of republican movement for recognition and voice within the arena of Northern Ireland politics", as well as about the issue of decommissioning, helped me in understanding the full, underlying meaning of what was going on along the difficoult months following the Good Friday Agreement.

Customer Reviews:

An outstanding survey of its actual making and includes plenty of vintage black & white photos & illustrations rich in detail.......2006-05-23

Plenty of books have been published on the sinking of the Titanic, but this is the first detailed account of how the ship was designed and constructed and provides a haunting view of how it was made and promoted. Where competitors focus on its demise or its voyage, BUILDING THE TITANIC: AN EPIC TALE OF THE CREATION OF HISTORY'S MOST FAMOUS OCEAN LINER is an outstanding survey of its actual making and includes plenty of vintage black and white photos and illustrations rich in detail.

Diane C. Donovan, Editor
California Bookwatch

RMS Titanic Construction.......2006-02-22

I am very disappointed in the editing of the book, many many typographical errors! Also, the book did not go into detail about the various construction techniques that went into building the ship. I wanted a step by step process especially in the interior construction of the cabins and public rooms, i.e. construction from the bulkhead/exterior skin, insulation, woodwork, plastering, wiring, plumbing etc.

The Best Technical Description of the Ship Yet.......2005-11-06

All of us know a bit about the voyage of the Titanic. Yet less has been published about the design and construction of the ship. This book begins with a general discussion of the North Atlantic passenger trade from its early days to show why the Titanic was the logical choice for the next ship to be built. From here it goes into the design and construction of the ship. Everything from the boilers, to the double hull are discussed. Numerous photographs show points in the construction and give you a feeling of the giant size of the vessel when men are shown standing next to the truly titanic size of the vessel.

About the last third of the book is on the trip, the rescue and aftermath of the sinking. The story of the impact is well told. The Titanic was designed to float when two watertight compartments were open to the sea. But this impact tore open five compartments. The tear was not big, but it was long, some 300ft. And it was big enough.

There is quite a bit of discussion about the life boats. There was an insufficient number of lifeboats to hold all the people. But the lifeboats that were available often carried only half their rated capacity. Further, the sea was very flat that night, the lifeboats could well have been overloaded and the number of survivors would have been much higher.

This book is very interesting in its details on the ship itself, and the collection of antique photograps is great.

Belfast: Segregation, Violence and the City (Contemporary Irish Studies)

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Belfast: Segregation, Violence and the City (Contemporary Irish Studies)
Peter Shirlow , and Brendan Murtagh
Manufacturer: Pluto Press
ProductGroup: Book
Binding: Paperback

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ASIN: 0745324800

Footprint Belfast & North Of Ireland (Footprint Belfast & the North of Ireland Pocket Guide)

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Footprint Belfast & North Of Ireland (Footprint Belfast & the North of Ireland Pocket Guide)
Sean Sheehan
Manufacturer: Footprint Handbooks
ProductGroup: Book
Binding: Paperback

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ASIN: 1904777392

Book Description

Smart, contemporary and compact guide helping travellers discover more from their city visit. Covers main attractions but also gives the freedom to escape the tourist trail.

Urban Planning and Cultural Inclusion: Lessons from Belfast and Berlin (Anglo-German Foundation)

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Urban Planning and Cultural Inclusion: Lessons from Belfast and Berlin (Anglo-German Foundation)

Manufacturer: Palgrave Macmillan
ProductGroup: Book
Binding: Hardcover

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ASIN: 0333793684

Book Description

Cities divided by ethnic and cultural conflict seek to create and maintain a viable sense of shared identity if they are to survive. Urban planning and management protect diversity while avoiding becoming a disconnected conglomeration. Belfast and Berlin are currently in the process of responding to this challenge: What will the implications be for town planners and how do they approach their task?

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Exceptional work.

Belfast Confetti
Ciaran Carson
Manufacturer: Wake Forest University Press
ProductGroup: Book
Binding: Paperback

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ASIN: 0916390403

Customer Reviews:

Exceptional work........1998-02-12

"Belfast Confetti", along with Carson's 1987 "The Irish For No", are the most impressive volumes of poetry I have read in recent years. I could (and do, as an English student) pour over the poems for hour. He is wonderfully skilled at interconnecting his work and setting a real sense of place. Carson explores Belfast and the way the city and its people have changed in the last four decades or so since his youth. He is concerned not with judging the changes, but in examining the ways in which the Troubles, the English presence, and modernization have affected Belfast/Northern irish culture and the way his own memory betrays the truth as it falters. These are rich books, they keep you looking over & over for more layers. I also reccommend, if you can find it, his 1997 prose work, "The Star Factory". Its themes and subjects tie right back in with BC and TIFN.

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