Ireland

Joyce and the Hungarian connection

Sunday, 16 June 2019 Szombathely might seem an unlikely place to stage a Bloomsday celebration, but James Joyce was careful to weave the Magyar city into Ulysses’s narrative, writes Michael Roddy By Michael Roddy Jun 16, 2019 About a dozen of us, mostly Irish, mostly cold, stood on the wet and windswept main square of…Read more Joyce and the Hungarian connection

Paul Simon, 51 years, 8 months and 22 days later…

There's nothing quite like seeing and hearing a singer you first heard half a century ago and finding out that, yes, he was pretty great then and maybe he's greater now. So it was for me attending, with my wife Patricia, Paul Simon's “Homeward Bound – The Farewell Tour 2018” in Dublin at the RDS…Read more Paul Simon, 51 years, 8 months and 22 days later…

Joyce’s “The Dead” Lives On…

  DUBLIN - One of my most daunting challenges of recent years has been preparing an introduction to James Joyce's famous short story "The Dead" for a 30-strong Irish Joyce reading group that meets at Tom Fitzgerald's pub in Glasthule of a Wednesday morning. This is the last of the 15 stories in Joyce's short-story…Read more Joyce’s “The Dead” Lives On…

Shane MacGowan’s Best Dub B’day Bash Ever

There were so many incredible moments during the three-hour-long 60th birthday tribute to Pogues songster Shane MacGowan in Dublin on Monday night that it's hard to pick the highlights, but here's a try:  Sinead O'Connor walking onstage unannounced to kick off part two with a searing version of "You're the One" Lisa O'Neill and Glen…Read more Shane MacGowan’s Best Dub B’day Bash Ever

Preserving Ireland’s past – for the love of it

TULSK, Ireland - Finding pieces of wood mixed in with turf in an Irish peat bog is nothing unusual. Recognising those rods as part of a trap that prehistoric man used to impale deer in 1,200 BC requires someone with skill and know-how. One such person is Christy Lawless, 70, an amateur archaeologist from County…Read more Preserving Ireland’s past – for the love of it

Barry, Ades and “Alice” in tune at Dublin music fest…

Soprano Claudia Boyle's voice soaring into the stratosphere singing the word “down” as she plunged into the rabbit hole in Irish composer Gerald Barry's “Alice's Adventures Under Ground” was thrilling but was only one of many highlights of the New Music Dublin 2017 festival. From Thursday, March 2, through Saturday, Dublin's National Concert Hall banished…Read more Barry, Ades and “Alice” in tune at Dublin music fest…

“Never forget” — the Yellow Star Houses of Budapest…

Irish professional photographer Nigel Swann says one of the most telling details of his photograph of one of the “Yellow Star Houses” of Budapest didn't hit him until he examined it later – the name “Jakab” spray-painted on the apartment block's front door. “It just jumped out at me and there was this 'Jakab' graffiti…Read more “Never forget” — the Yellow Star Houses of Budapest…