Customer Reviews

Ireland: A HISTORY FROM THE TWELFTH CENTURY TO TH

5 star:		(2)
4 star:		(0)
3 star:		(0)
2 star:		(1)
1 star:		(3)

 

 

Too concise to really offer much illumination. Very brief on the various Irish heroes (Parnell, O'Connell, etc.). In the face of centuries of British destruction in Ireland, the author is somehow anti-Irish. Not worth time or money.

Anyone who has read other, more balanced histories of Ireland will note a strong anti-Irish slant in Johnson's history. Though his breezy, gossipy style may be fun for other historical topics, it's not helpful in sorting out the complexities of Ireland.

It is difficult to write a good book on a subject one dislikes and, clearly, Johnson is not fond of the Irish.

This is an eminently readable, informative history of Ireland from the twelfth century up to the late 1970's. Unlike many histories, it is not a list of statistics. Nor is it an appeal to our sensibilities. It is swift, yet comprehensive.

I should really have known better than to pick up a book written by this crusty old gentleman. I have never been a fan of Paul Johnson - his periodic op-ed pieces in Forbes magazine never fail to make my blood boil. However, it is his anti-Irish vitriol that really puzzles me. I knew of his bias before I bought this book, but decided to give it a shot anyway.

What a mistake.

This man clearly lives in an era long-since passed. At least, it has passed for most Irish and English people. The mutual distrust, the fatalistic refusal to let go of history and the constant sniping at one-another would all essentially be done, if it were not for old die-hards like Johnson. Perhaps he lacks a target that irks him more than the Irish, or perhaps it is just a matter of geographical convenience for him. Whatever the reason, in this book, Johnson never misses an opportunity to twist the knife in the back of the Irish as a whole.

There are far better written and better thought-out compilations on Irish history without having to suffer through one written by a man who once called for financial sanctions to be imposed on the entire Irish population to compensate for IRA activity in mainland Britain. Perhaps, Mr. Johnson, the Irish people could best respond by speaking your own language - imposing sanctions on pompous old curmudgeons like yourself for years forwarding an agenda of brutal division of the island of Ireland. Or perhaps one of the many gifted Irish authors could simply write a scathing account of the bloody and tainted history of your people. In my opinion, the best response is to do nothing. People of this ilk are almost entirely irrelevant in the modern countries of Britain and Ireland. Perhaps if we just ignore Mr. Johnson long enough, he will disappear into a chasm of his own bitterness and spite.

This seems to treat the various causes and factions in Ireland with fairness. It is a very readable account with interesting quotes from persons who observed things first-hand.