The Last Irish Question: Will Six into Twenty-Six Ever Go?

Description

A view of the south of Ireland - political, social, geographical - through the eyes of a liberal northern protestant being asked to rejoin it. 'A pleasure to read... Incisively mixing memoir, reportage and analysis' Daily Mail 'Discursive, humane and meticulously attentive to verbal nuances that can spell a world of meaning' Irish Examiner 'Patterson's travels provide humorous asides, telling insights and sobering pessimism' Irish Independent The reunification of Ireland, which in 1998 seemed to have been pushed over the far horizon as an aspiration, has returned with a vengeance. Brexit calls into question the British commitment to Northern Ireland and threatens its economy. There has been a surge in support for Sinn Fein in the South, a party pushing relentlessly for a poll on the future of the border. If Sinn Fein enters the government of the Republic, as seems inevitable in the coming years, this issue will move even higher up the agenda, with who knows what consequences north of the border. In The Last Irish Question, Glenn Patterson travels the country, looking at this place he is being asked to join and which a significant number of people in the North have spent a very long time shunning. Most of the South is terra incognita to them (as it is to many people who live in Dublin). There have been countless books describing and travelling through Ulster, but never one that turns its gaze the other way. Brilliantly witty and alarmingly topical, this is a social, political and geographical view of the South of Ireland, as well as a journey of discovery for a quizzical Northerner being asked to rejoin it.

Glenn Patterson was born in Belfast. The author of fifteen previous works of fiction and non-fiction, he co-wrote the screenplay of the film Good Vibrations. He is currently Director of the Seamus Heaney Centre at Queen's University.

A pleasure to read, forensically and wittily observed, incisively mixing memoir, reportage and analysis * Daily Mail * 'He has a light touch, a way of glancing off things and leaving our perception of them changed. He can dazzle. He tells a good story' Irish Times. * Irish Times * Glenn Patterson's travels around the country provide humorous asides, telling insights and sobering pessimism * Irish Independent * Discursive, humane, and meticulously attentive to verbal nuances that can spell a world of meaning, there is plenty to enjoy on this lively road with Patterson * Irish Examiner * Patterson's musings are always laced with black humour * Sunday Business Post *