My Book Reviews

Here, I would like to talk about two contrasting books (i) a history book and (ii) an OUP Book for Master's level Social Science courses.  They both treat the question of identity from vastly different perspectives.  The first is essentially about how a nation's identity is formed, while the latter deals with the formation of the individual's identity within society. (i) The Irish Story: Telling Tales and Making it up in Ireland  Roy Foster is considered one of the foremost "revisionist"  Irish historians.   As well as early biographies of Charles Stewart Parnell  and Lord Randolph Churchil l , he is the author of many books on Irish history  and is currently the Carroll Builders Professor of Irish History at Hertford College, Oxford.     More recently, Foster has produced a much acclaimed two-part biography of W.B. Yeats  which was awarded the James Tait Black Memorial Prize.  However, I was interested in this litt...

1. A Little History of Philosophy by Nigel Warburton , Yale University Press, 2012 This book is a delightful, interesting, rewarding and entertaining read.  As its title suggests, it is a light read that brings the reader right into the heart of the main points of the history of Western Philosophy.  It is also an enlightening and informative read as Warburton possesses a lightness of touch that belies or disguises a marvellous depth of knowledge.  The wonder of this book is that it is at once both entertaining and informative.  This is Warburton's strength as an author, and he is a wonderful teacher and lecturer.  One note on the back cover of my edition puts it succinctly: "He has a special gift for defusing complexity."  Warburton gives us a potted history of philosophy in forty chapters, each of which deals with a major philosopher, occasionally two.  The titles of each chapter are succinct as they pose the central question or problem t...

My Copies of  these Books Ivor Browne  is in the news of late because he has published his collected writings, which span a period of fifty or more years as Ireland's leading psychiatrist .  This second book from his pen is simply called The Writings of Ivor Browne: Steps Along The Road: The Evolution of A Slow Learner (Atrium, UCC, 2013)  Previous to this he published a memoir   entitled:   Music and Madness   (Atrium, UCC, 2008)  Therein, Browne tells the story of his unusually controversial and long career in psychiatry in Ireland.   I have had the privilege of hearing   Ivor  once and of having read several articles from his pen as well as many reviews of his work.  He was utterly sincere, passionate and inspiring as a speaker. He is also a wonderfully sensitive and compassionate human being and a marvellous Irish psychiatrist who has a broad humanitarian vision of the myriad possibilities of the human race. Ivor...

My copies of the two books reviewed here What I love about books is the way they make me think and feel, the way, indeed, they expand both of these human attributes in me, forcing me to think and to feel more and more either in a wider or deeper sense, even if only second hand.  This post will not offer a review or several reviews but rather what I term "shorter notes" on some books I have found both enlightening and challenging. I also read for sheer escapism and enjoyment, but if you are a reader, you will realise that these particular sentiments are not ruled out if a book is challenging and makes you think.   (i) Flourishing by Maureen Gaffney (Penguin Books, 2012).  This is an engaging book that is written in a lively and direct style.  One is engrossed in it from the first sentence, which shows the author's rootedness in experience and in the now: "On my desk as I write..." (p.ix). However, this is much more than a self-help book because it is ba...