Interview with Clodagh Finn, author of Through Her Eyes: A New History of Ireland in 21 Women
Clodagh Finn, author of Through Her Eyes: A New History of Ireland in 21 Women, this week gives us some great book recommendations! Before jumping into the interview, please check out Clodagh's book:
Review From Book Depository
This remarkable book provides an account of the history of Ireland like we've never seen before. Told through the prism of the lives of twenty-one extraordinary women, it offers an alternative vision of Irish history, one that puts the spotlight on women whose contributions have been forgotten or overlooked.
(Prices accurate at time of writing)
Through Her Eyes: A New History of Ireland in 21 Women
From the oldest woman in Ireland, whose bones were found beneath the Poulnabrone dolmen, to the modern-day founder of a 3D printing company, this book introduces us to amazing women whose stories were shaped by the centuries in which they lived.
Buy On:
Book Depository €20.05
Waterstones £17.99
Wordery $12.09
Q. Do you have a favourite smart thinking book (and why that book)?
I love anything by classicist Mary Beard as she challenges, informs and entertains. Women and Power is a brilliant study of how female voices have been silenced for centuries, as well as a clarion call to women to speak up now. Pompeii also stands out as it vividly brings to life the ordinary citizens who once inhabited the ghostly ruins of a Roman city destroyed by a volcano in 79AD.
Review From Book Depository
Britain's best-known classicist Mary Beard, is also a committed and vocal feminist. With wry wit, she revisits the gender agenda and shows how history has treated powerful women. Her examples range from the classical world to the modern day, from Medusa and Athena to Theresa May and Hillary Clinton. Beard explores the cultural underpinnings of misogyny, considering the public voice of women, our cultural assumptions about women's relationship with power, and how powerful women resist being packaged into a male template.
(All links earn commission from purchases. Prices accurate at time of writing) Review From Book Depository
The ruins of Pompeii, buried by an explosion of Vesuvius in 79 CE, offer the best evidence we have of everyday life in the Roman empire. This remarkable book rises to the challenge of making sense of those remains, as well as exploding many myths: the very date of the eruption, probably a few months later than usually thought; or the hygiene of the baths which must have been hotbeds of germs; or the legendary number of brothels, most likely only one; or the massive death count, maybe less than ten per cent of the population.
(All links earn commission from purchases. Prices accurate at time of writing)
Women & Power: A Manifesto
A year on since the advent of #metoo, Beard looks at how the discussions have moved on during this time, and how that intersects with issues of rape and consent, and the stories men tell themselves to support their actions. In trademark Beardian style, using examples ancient and modern, Beard argues, 'it's time for change - and now!'
Buy On:
Book Depository €6.62
Waterstones £6.99
Wordery $8.04
Pompeii: The Life of a Roman Town
An extraordinary and involving portrait of an ancient town, its life and its continuing re-discovery, by Britain's favourite classicist.
Buy On:
Book Depository €9.13
Waterstones £9.99
Q. What's the most recent smart thinking book you've read (and how would you rate it)?
I’m not sure you’d call it a smart-thinking book but it certainly challenged my thinking. The Silence of the Girls by Pat Barker is a powerful retelling of the Trojan war through the eyes of Briseis, who was given to Achilles as his concubine. It is a work of stunning fiction but also one that challenges us to seek out female voices in history. The Irrational Ape, David Robert Grimes’ book on how critical thinking can save the world, is in my pandemic reading pile.
Review From Book Depository:
There was a woman at the heart of the Trojan war whose voice has been silent - till now. Discover the greatest Greek myth of all - retold by the witness that history forgot . . .
(All links earn commission from purchases. Prices accurate at time of writing) Review From Book Depository:
In The Irrational Ape, David Robert Grimes shows how we can be lured into making critical mistakes or drawing false conclusions, and how to avoid such errors. Given the power of modern science and the way that movements can unite to protest a cause via social media, we are in dangerous times. But fortunately, we can learn from our mistakes, and by critical thinking and scientific method we can discover how to apply these techniques to everything from deciding what insurance to buy to averting global disaster. This book, packed with fascinating case studies and examples, helps ensure we are ready for the modern world.
(All links earn commission from purchases. Prices accurate at time of writing)
The Silence of the Girls
Briseis was a queen until her city was destroyed. Now she is slave to Achilles, the man who butchered her husband and brothers. Trapped in a world defined by men, can she survive to become the author of her own story?
Buy On:
Book Depository €8.22
Waterstones £7.49
Wordery $11.16
The Irrational Ape: Why Flawed Logic Puts us all at Risk and How Critical Thinking Can Save the World
Why did revolutionary China consider the sparrow an 'animal of capitalism' - and what happened when they tried to wipe them out? With a cast of murderous popes, snake-oil salesmen and superstitious pigeons, find out why flawed logic puts us all at risk, and how critical thinking can save the world.
Buy On:
Book Depository €16.60
Waterstones £18.99
Q. Do you have a favourite childhood book?
Danny, the Champion of the World by Roald Dahl. It’s a wonderful story of a father and son who live in a caravan and use raisins (laced with sleeping pills) to poach pheasants.
Danny the Champion of the World
Review From Book Depository
Danny lives in a caravan with his father, the most marvellous and exciting father any boy ever had.
All the land around them belongs to Mr Victor Hazell, a rich snob with a great glistening beery face and tiny piggy eyes. Nobody likes him, not one-little bit.
So one day, Danny and his father concoct a daring plot that will give the old blue-faced baboon Victor Hazell the greatest shock of his life - so long as they don't get caught ...
Buy On:
Book Depository €6.62 Waterstones £6.99 Wordery $8.67(All links earn commission from purchases that help fund this site. Prices accurate at time of writing)
Q. Do you prefer reading on paper, Kindle or listening to an audiobook?
Definitely paper. I love the smell and feel of a book.
Q. Do you have a favourite bookshop (and why that shop)?
Polymath in Tralee, Woulfe’s in Listowel, Philip’s Bookshop in Mallow. There are so many great bookshops around the country. I also love Shakespeare and Company in Paris, where its wonderfully eccentric owner, the late George Whitman, had me staining the bookshelves with cold tea when I was volunteering there one summer. It works surprisingly well!
Huge thanks to Clodagh for answering my questions and for recommending a fasciating range of books! It was also a joy to find out about another Irish connection to Shakespeare and Company! :-) Please don't forget to check out her book Through Her Eyes: A New History of Ireland in 21 Women.
Daryl
Image Copyrights: Gill (Through Her Eyes), Profile Books Ltd (Women and Power, Pompeii), Penguin Books Ltd (The Silence of the Girls), Simon & Schuster Ltd (The Irrational Ape), Penguin Random House Children's UK (Danny the Champion of the World)
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