Interview with Lila Haines, author of Radicals & Realists : Political Parties in Ireland: A Concise History
Lila Haines, author of Radicals & Realists : Political Parties in Ireland: A Concise History recommends an interesting selection of books! Before jumping into the interview, please check out Lila's book:
Review from Book Depository:
An essential introduction to Irish politics, Radicals and Realists expertly analyses the political parties that have influenced the history of pre- and post-partition Ireland.
Lila Haines' rigorously researched guide provides concise histories of the island's 12 most significant political parties, revealing their ideals and deals, clashes and collaborations, and splinters and mergers.
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Radicals & Realists: Political Parties in Ireland: A Concise History
Dispassionate and insightful, Radicals and Realists discusses the achievements, trends and milestones of the contemporary two-jurisdiction island. It also demolishes popular myths and reveals the inconvenient truths about political ineptitude, corruption, authoritarianism or tolerance of terrorism that some parties may prefer to forget or rewrite.
Radicals and Realists is an indispensable companion for all who wish to understand how political parties in Ireland have evolved, and how their electoral fortunes are shaping the future of the island they share.
Buy On:
Book Depository €26.19
Waterstones £19.99
Wordery $23.37
Q. Do you have a favourite smart thinking book (and why that book)?
In Doughnut Economics Kate Raworth offers an alternative to the traditional obsession with growth at all costs that is rapidly depleting the earth’s resources. Her clever graphic illustrates the key factors that would allow humanity to thrive within an environmentally safe and socially just ‘sweet spot’ inside the doughnut. Review From Book Depository
The book that redefines economics for a world in crisis.
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Perhaps I should admit that my own ‘doughnut economics’ Eureka! moment actually occurred before the book was even written, while I was working with Oxfam and had the opportunity to read the policy paper in which Kate floated her ‘doughnut’ concept. It’s been fascinating to see it develop into a book that challenges old-fashioned economic thinking in very practical and academically rigorous ways.
Doughnut Economics: Seven Ways to Think Like a 21st-Century Economist
Relentless financial crises. Extreme inequalities in wealth. Remorseless pressure on the environment. Anyone can see that our economic system is broken. But can it be fixed?
In Doughnut Economics, Oxford academic Kate Raworth identifies the seven critical ways in which mainstream economics has led us astray - from selling us the myth of 'rational economic man' to obsessing over growth at all costs - and offers instead an alternative roadmap for bringing humanity into a sweet spot that meets the needs of all within the means of the planet. Ambitious, radical and provocative, she offers a new cutting-edge economic model fit for the challenges of the 21st century.
Buy On:
Easons €15.40
Book Depository €14.93
Waterstones £10.99
Wordery $12.99
Q. What's the most recent smart thinking book you've read (and how would you rate it)?
The Madness: a memoir of war, fear and PTSD, by Fergal Keane Review From Book Depository:
As a journalist Keane has covered conflict and brutality across the world for more than thirty years, from Rwanda, Sudan, South Africa, Somalia, Iraq, Afghanistan, Ukraine and many more. Driven by an irresistible compulsion to be where the night is darkest, he made a name for reporting with humanity and empathy from places where death and serious injury were not abstractions, and tragedy often just a moment's bad luck away.
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Initially it didn’t occur to me to categorise The Madness in any way. I was just interested in learning more about Fergal Keane, the journalist whose voice had informed me about conflicts in Northern Ireland, Rwanda, South Africa, Iraq and other war zones. I expected to learn how journalists like him survived or suffered - but his vivid writing took me far beyond his own suffering, and opened my mind to the cross-generational effects of traumatic experiences.
Seeking the source of addictive behaviour within his own family, Keane trawled back through history, including the horrors of Ireland’s Great Famine in the 1840s. His belief that their inherited memory of the famine drove some members of his family to political violence decades later raises wider questions about the long-term social and political effects of trauma. And not just in Ireland. How many generations, how many millions of people, will suffer mental, physical and economic agonies from our planet’s current wars? millions of people
The Madness: A Memoir of War, Fear and PTSD
But all this time he struggled not to be overwhelmed by another story, his acute 'complex post-traumatic stress disorder', a condition arising from exposure to multiple instances of trauma experienced over a long period. This condition has caused him to suffer a number of mental breakdowns and hospitalisations. Despite this, and countless promises to do otherwise, he has gone back to the wars again and again.
Why?
In this powerful and intensely personal book, Keane interrogates what it is that draws him to the wars, what keeps him there and offers a reckoning of the damage done.
PTSD affects people from all walks of life. Trauma can be found in many places, not just war. Keane's book speaks to the struggle of all who are trying to recover from injury, addiction and mental breakdown. It is a survivor's story drawn from lived experience, told with honesty, courage and an open heart.
Buy On:
Easons €15.99
Book Depository €19.38
Waterstones £22.00
Wordery $20.73
Q. Do you have a favourite childhood book?
As a child I read everything I could get my hands on but it’s hard to remember anything special from so long ago. I vividly remember some I read to my children, though, like the Irish translation of Ra ta ta tam – Scéilín Traeinín, by Peter Nickl & Binette Schroeder, the marvellously illustrated adventures of a tiny train.
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Ra ta ta tam Scéilín Traeinín
Scéilín gleoite faoi thraein bheag a rinne fear beag agus a raibh bua draíochta ag baint léi. Ní mór duit é a léamh duit féin chun deireadh an aistir a shroicheadh slán!
For train lovers, young and old. Fantastic illustrations.
Buy On:
Litríocht €3.75
Q. Do you prefer reading on paper, Kindle or listening to an audiobook?
Paper, definitely. Kindle is for emergencies, to avert panic when travelling, or if it’s the quickest or cheapest way to get a book I need for research. As for audiobooks, I just can’t get on with them, not even on a long journey.
Q. Do you have a favourite bookshop (and why that shop)?
I’d love to say that I’m irresistibly drawn to my local bookshop, but there isn’t one near me. To enjoy a good browse I have to catch a train – to Griffin Books in Penarth, which is tiny but perfectly curated, or Waterstones in central Cardiff. Mr B’s Emporium in Bath is amazing, a rambling house packed with books I didn’t know I needed, so maybe it’s better for my pocket that it’s rather far away.
Many thanks to Lila for recommending an interesting selection of books! Please don't forget to check out Radicals & Realists : Political Parties in Ireland: A Concise History.
Daryl
Image Copyrights: Welsh Academic Press (Radicals & Realists), Cornerstone (Doughnut Economics), HarperCollins Publishers (The Madness), Jonathan Cape, London (RA TA TA TAM).
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