Lilliput has two new interesting titles. Mushroom Man is the first novel by food-writer and bon viveur Paulo Tullio. It is flagged as "part cyber-narrative, part psychological thriller" where "the spirit of the 1960s meets the millennium". Visiting Rwanda is veteran travel-writer Dervla Murphy's account of travelling through post-genocide Rwanda, the "land of a thousand mountains" which has suffered so terribly. My Life And Times (Poolbeg) is Conor Cruise O'Brien's autobiography, which will be published on his 80th birthday next November. He will "use his life as a prism through which to view his times" says the catalogue, spanning the Cruiser's diverse and often controversial involvements in the fields of politics, academia, newspapers, history and much more. There is also a new biography of Sean O'Casey forthcoming from Gill & Macmillan by former Abbey director Hugh Hunt.
There are many books planned to commemorate 1798. One which looks promising is Rebellion In Wicklow 1798 (Irish Academic Press) by Ruan O'Donnell. Much is known about Wexford's role, but Wicklow was also a hotbed and rebel activity was kept going there long after many other parts of the country had given up. This book investigates the county-level United Irishman organisation as well as the course of the rebellion in Wicklow from start to finish.
Cork University Press is publishing another 1798 book - an eye-witness account by Andrew Bryson of Co Down. A United Irishman like his father, he was enlisted into the army as a punishment for his rebel activities. He managed to escape to New York and wrote his sister a long letter about his adventures. The letter will be published by CUP as part of its new Irish Narrative series, edited by David Fitzpatrick. The series of short paperbacks is devoted to first-hand accounts - diaries, letters - by people involved in major historical events.
There are more first-hand accounts in Curious Journey
(Mercier), subtitled An Oral History Of Ireland's Un- finished Revolution. The book is a series of interviews with nine veterans - men and women - of the Easter Rising and the Civil War. The interviewees come from different parts of Ireland and different social classes. The editors are film-maker Kenneth Griffith and novelist Timothy E. O'Grady. Another interesting way of looking at history is through cartoons. Drawing Conclusions: A Cartoon History Of Anglo-Irish Relations 1798-1998 (Blackstaff) is edited by Roy Douglas, Liam Harte and Jim O'Hara.
Green English (O'Brien) by Loreto Todd is an exploration of the origins and development of English in Ireland and how Irish travellers, missionaries and writers have influenced English worldwide.
And from New Island, there is A Book Of Matches, edited by George O'Brien, which features essays by a host of Irish writers, male and female, on the role of sport in our national psyche. Self-help books tend to be seen as strictly for "the women's market". I Don't Want To Talk About It (Gill & Macmillan) is a book by Cambridgebased psychotherapist Terrence Real, which is written for men. Subtitled Overcoming The Secret Legacy Of Male Depression, the book could not be more timely, given that the suicide rate among young men is so alarmingly high. As for poetry, Cork University Press is publishing a wide-ranging collection of Eighteenth Century Irish Verse In English, edited by Andrew Carpenter, which incorporates a great deal more than the usual Jonathan Swift offerings, including poetry by "ordinary people" which gives an insight into life in Ireland then.
At The Year's Turning (Dedalus) is an anthology edited by Marco Sonzogni where 60 Irish poets have written responses to poems by the celebrated Italian poet, Giacomo Leopardi. Poet Thomas McCarthy has produced a collection of essays - part memoir, part literary commentary - entitled Gardens Of Remembrance, due from New Island Books. Leland Bardwell will publish a new collection, Pagan At The Table (Salmon). The poems, although all new, span three decades, starting in the 1960s. Bardwell is an accomplished poet who has not received the attention she deserves.
An interesting examination of comparative politics should be The Republican Ideal: Current Perspectives (Blackstaff), edited by Norman Porter. Different people from across the political spectrum - from the PUP to Sinn Fein - give their ideas of what republicanism means to them. And from Wolfhound, a book on the Hepatitis C scandal, entitled Blood, Sweat And Tears, by Glenys Spray (a delegate to the National Women's Council) investigates how the lives of more than 1,000 women have been affected by the biggest public health scandal of our time.