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The Easter Rising
On Easter Monday, between 1,000 and 1,500 Irish Volunteers and members of the Irish Citizen Army seized the General Post Office and other key locations in Dublin. The intention of their leaders, including Patrick Pearse and James Connolly, was to end British rule in Ireland and establish an independent thirty-two county Irish republic. For a week battle raged in the Irish capital until the Rising collapsed. The rebel leaders were executed soon afterwards, though in death their ideals quickly triumphed. lluminating every aspect of that fateful Easter week, The Easter Rising is based on an impressive range of original sources. It has been fully revised, expanded and updated in the light of a wealth of new material and extensive use has been made of almost 2,000 witness statements that the Bureau of Military History in Dublin gathered from participants in the Rising. The result is a vivid depiction of the personalities and actions not just of the leaders on both sides but the rank and file and civilians as well. The book brings the reader closer to the events of 1916 than has previously been possible and provides an exceptional account of a city at war.
Unknown Binding
First published August 30, 2000
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Displaying 1 - 5 of 5 reviews
October 9, 2025
For the layman this ticked enough boxes and gives a good account of this important moment in Irish history early in the 20th century, but I'd imagine for those looking for something more substantial works on the subject to look elsewhere. If, like me, you wanted to learn of this history having known hardly anything about it, then it's worth a read.
November 16, 2021
Superbly researched and well written - but I was left nearly as clueless about the big picture of the Easter Rising as I was when I started. If you're already familiar with the events of the Rising and you want an in-depth examination of individual storylines, this is the book for you.
October 9, 2018
Brilliant!
April 15, 2016
Written by a school teacher at Methodist College Belfast and a former pupil of the college, this is an accessible history that will find traction with secondary school audiences. Scholarly, yes; but it does not bring nearly the same academic rigour as Townshend or even Caulfield.
On the positive side, it presents the key events of the Rising in handy chapters dealing with each of the rebel positions in turn. This offers a degree of clarity that the day-to-day narratives followed by other histories do not (Particularly for one who is unfamiliar with the geography of early 20th Century Dublin).
On the negative, in striving for balance and impartiality, the authors have lost much of the brutality and horror and avoided the growing debates that surround the Rising and its place in Irish history.
A readable introduction, but far from being the 'standard work' that its endorsements suggest.
On the positive side, it presents the key events of the Rising in handy chapters dealing with each of the rebel positions in turn. This offers a degree of clarity that the day-to-day narratives followed by other histories do not (Particularly for one who is unfamiliar with the geography of early 20th Century Dublin).
On the negative, in striving for balance and impartiality, the authors have lost much of the brutality and horror and avoided the growing debates that surround the Rising and its place in Irish history.
A readable introduction, but far from being the 'standard work' that its endorsements suggest.
February 14, 2015
Full of stats and detail of the military strategy which gets too cumbersome. The best pieces are when the feeling and response of the people are described. No matter what your opinion on the Rising is, they were incredibly brave.
Displaying 1 - 5 of 5 reviews