Irish Biography

Did you know that a poet named William Drennan was the first to name Ireland the “Emerald Island”? He was referring to the green hills of Ireland’s countryside in his poem “When Erin first rose”. The countryside is what defines Ireland probably the best since, for a long time, it played a major role in the economy and culture of the nation.

The autobiographical account of how the Irish writer Felicity Hayes-McCoy and her English husband, opera director Wilf Judd, chose to divide their life between inner-city London and a remote house on Ireland's Dingle Peninsula, a place Felicity fell in love with at the age of 17.

No Irish rugby player has ever achieved more, or been a source of more inspiration to teammates and fans alike, than Johnny Sexton. All of this would have seemed highly unlikely as late as May 2009, when – aged 24 – he was nowhere near first choice at Leinster, and still uncapped by Ireland. In his hotly anticipated autobiography, Johnny will tell the story of his life, and explore the sources of his unmatched will to win.

On the streets of the tough Dublin inner-city neighbourhood where he grew up, Gerry Hutch was perceived as an ordinary decent criminal, a quintessential Robin Hood figure who fought the law—and won. To the rest of the world he was an elusive criminal godfather called the Monk: an enigmatic criminal mastermind and the hunted leader of one side in the deadliest gangland feud in Irish criminal history.

Today, Tipperary-born priest Patrick Ryan cuts a modest but strong figure, to the layperson. A man of God who has been entrusted with the confessions of hundreds of earnest parishioners. But in fact his story is dark, dramatic, and pivotal to Irish history, on both sides of the border. In The Padre, award-winning investigative journalist Jennifer O'Leary exposes the paramilitary exploits of notorious former Catholic priest and active IRA supporter Patrick Ryan–exposing details which have, outside of his very guarded circles, been unknown until now.

"Irish" Micky Ward grew up in the 1970s and ’80s as a tough kid from Lowell, Massachusetts - a town where boxers were once bred as a means of survival. A hard worker who overcame bad luck, bad management, and chronic pain in his hands, he avoided the pitfall of poverty and dead-end work that plagued Lowell to become a Golden Gloves junior welterweight. Ward participated in street fights from an early age and was forever known by his opponents and spectators as the underdog.

Ireland, 1845. To Briana Walsh, no place on earth is more beautiful than Carrowteige, County Mayo. The small farms that surround the centuries-old Lear House are managed by her father, agent to the wealthy, reckless Sir Thomas Blakely. Tenant farmers sell the oats and rye they grow to pay rent to Sir Thomas, surviving on the potatoes that flourish in the remaining scraps of land. But when the potato crop falls prey to a devastating blight, families Briana has known all her life are left with no food, no resources, and no mercy from the English landowner.

The Irish-American story, with all its twists and triumphs, is told through the improbable life of one man. A dashing young orator during the Great Famine of the 1840s, in which a million of his Irish countrymen died, Thomas Francis Meagher led a failed uprising against British rule, for which he was banished to a Tasmanian prison colony. He escaped and six months later was heralded in the streets of New York - the revolutionary hero, back from the dead, at the dawn of the great Irish immigration to America.

Grace O'Malley, daughter of a clan chief in the far west of Ireland, went from marriage at fifteen to piracy on the high seas. She soon had a fleet of galleys under her commander, but her three decades of plundering, kidnapping, murder and mayhem came to a close in 1586, when she was captured and sentenced to hang. Saved from the scaffold by none other than Queen Elizabeth herself—another powerful woman in a man's world—Grace's life took another extraordinary turn, when it was rumored she had become intelligencer for the queen's spymaster, Sir Francis Walsingham.

In the years leading up to 1606, since the death of Queen Elizabeth and the arrival in England of her successor, King James of Scotland, Shakespeare's great productivity had ebbed, and it may have seemed to some that his prolific genius was a thing of the past. But that year, at age 42, he found his footing again, finishing a play he had begun the previous autumn - King Lear - then writing two other great tragedies, Macbeth and Antony and Cleopatra.

"J'ai toujours eu un cœur excentrique." Bono a grandi dans le nord de Dublin entre un père catholique et une mère protestante, alors que les violences sectaires se multipliaient en Irlande. Il n'avait que quatorze ans lors du décès de sa mère, perte qui va façonner sa recherche d'une famille. Il a commencé sa vie avec le sentiment d'être quelconque, pourtant toute son existence sera consacrée à combattre l'idée que quiconque puisse l'être. En quatre décennies, U2 passe d'une bande d'adolescents ambitieux au plus grand groupe au monde.

Eamonn McCann’s account of what it is like to grow up a Catholic in a Northern Irish ghetto - first published in 1974 - quickly became a classic account of the feelings generated by British rule. The author was at the center of events in Derry which first brought Northern Ireland to world attention. He witnessed the gradual transformation of the civil rights movement from a mild campaign for “British Democracy” to an all-out military assault on the British state. This book describes the people involved in the war and gives an account of the springs of the "Catholic" opposition.

Ireland is inarguably a beautiful, enchanted place. But its history is more turbulent, fascinating, and terrible than any other. From the first English presence in Ireland in the 12th century, through siege, rebellion, and civil war, to Irish ascendancy, home rule, and the present-day troubles, best-selling author Paul Johnson tells, with remarkable clarity and concision, the compelling story of this most remarkable island.

Beneath the Surface tells that remarkable story. From the halls of University College Dublin in the 1970s, to a remote hospital in Tanzania where he would meet someone who was to have a transformative effect on his approach to health, and on through decades on the front line of Irish general practice, culminating in a life-altering realisation that would see him change the course of his career.

As much about the life of the city as it is about a life lived, sometimes, in the city, John Banville's "quasi-memoir" is as layered, emotionally rich, witty, and unexpected as any of his novels. Born and bred in a small town a train ride away from Dublin, Banville saw the city as a place of enchantment when he was a child, a birthday treat, the place where his beloved, eccentric aunt lived.

Thirty-five years ago, when they were in their 20s, Niall Williams and Christine Breen made the impulsive decision to leave their lives in New York City and move to Christine’s ancestral home in the town of Kiltumper in rural Ireland. In the decades that followed, the pair dedicated themselves to writing, gardening and living a life that followed the rhythms of the earth.

After an audacious assassination attempt on boss Daniel Kinahan's life, the Kinahan Cartel recruited an unprecedented number of killers to retaliate against their attackers, the Hutch gang. Kinahan Assassins is the compelling behind-the-scenes account of one man's thirst for vengeance and how it proved fatal for his organization. Kinahan Assassins has the stories of the men who killed for the cartel - including vulnerable drug addicts, a former British soldier, an MMA fighter and an invisible 'Mr Nobody' who acted as a cartel quartermaster - as well as those who gave them orders.

Irish mafia from the streets of Dublin to the highest echelons of global organised crime and right into the heart of professional boxing. When a weigh-in turns into a gangland bloodbath, the tables begin to turn on the powerful Kinahan Organised Crime Group. But is it too late to tame the beast or can the law finally catch up with the mob? With a unique insight into the rise of mob and its reach into boxing through a tapestry of confidential informants and some too-close-for-comfort experiences, Tallant brings to life one of the most extraordinary stories in modern organised crime.

This book is packed with trivia facts about Ireland. Some of the facts you’ll learn in this book are shocking, some are tragic, and others will leave you with goosebumps. But they’re all interesting! Whether you’re just learning about Ireland or you already think you’re an expert on the state, you’ll learn something you didn’t know in every chapter. Your history teacher will be interesting at all of your newfound knowledge.

Ireland's patron saint has long been shrouded in legend: he drove the snakes out of Ireland; he triumphed over Druids and their super-natural powers; he used a shamrock to explain the Christian mystery of the Trinity. But his true story is more fascinating than the myths.