The Irish

O'Hanlon, Thomas J.

ISBN 10: 0060132388 / ISBN 13: 9780060132385

Published by Harper & Row, New York, NY, U.S.A., 1975

About this Item

Slightly smaller book, black cloth, bright gilt lettering on spine, ink name and address at top inside front cover, 145 written on first front end paper, 316 lightly browned heavy pages plus brief biographical note. DJ beneath mylar, has white background with orange and green title, praise on back from The Center magazine and New York Times. DJ has very tiny thin tear at spine top left edge, microtear at top back tip. Fine DJ/Near Very Fine book.

Seller Inventory # 26391

Bibliographic Details

• Title: The Irish
• Publisher: Harper & Row, New York, NY, U.S.A.
• Publication Date: 1975
• Language: English
• ISBN 10: 0060132388
• ISBN 13: 9780060132385
• Binding: Cloth
• Edition: First Edition
• Condition: Fine
• Dust Jacket Condition: Fine
• Seller catalogs:
  • Ireland

About this title

Synopsis

In the tradition of Sampson's THE ANATOMY OF BRITAIN and Barzini's THE ITALIANS--but more ribald than either--Thomas O'Hanlon's THE IRISH is a vivid, loving, despairing, critical, informed, shrewd, sometimes shocking contemporary portrait of Ireland's green and troubled land.

His book is vibrant with persons and events that no tourist brochure would dear, dirty Dublin; the thorn hedges shutting out strangers from rural enclaves; the Anglo-Irish aristocrats and the legacy of class; the hidden wound of Ireland--the continuing loss of population to England, America, and points beyond; the baronial few and the wretched many; the omnipresent Church and its vigilant guardianship over faith, sex, and real estate; the cunning, profitable game of the Irish Sweepstakes with its international secret agents; the gradual sale of Ireland to foreign investors; the effect of membership in the Common Market and the tax-protected conglomerates; the reliance on superstition and alcohol; the increase in tranquilizers, gambling, prostitution, and abortion; the tragedy of Northern Ireland; the old and the new and Marxist IRA; the foreign artists who pay no taxes; the durable women who bear the children and the trouble and who have a sexual revolution in mind; the tourists from whom the truths are kept.

This is a book that exorcises myths, seeking to bring the light of day to dark corners. It is a book of pain but also of humor and hope, an unsparing examination but also a loving tribute to a land that against the odds gambles on its instinct for the art of survival.