Category Archives: This sceptred isle

A neighbour who lived across the fields in rural Co Down used to tell of going to a horse race meeting at Downpatrick with a group of friends from work. Lurking around the entrance was a man offering brown envelopes … Continue reading →

Against the background of a Northern Ireland election campaign, I had called at the woman’s house. Her mother was seriously ill, her husband suffered a long-term debilitating condition, and she was struggling with the accounts of the family business. A … Continue reading →

Among early political memories are stories of the Battle of Cable Street, a generation before I was born. The “battle” was a violent demonstration, in October 1936, by residents of London’s East End borough of Stepney, along with Communists, anarchists … Continue reading →

It is some forty years since a brief flirtation with Trotskyite politics. Joining the Labour Party as a seventeen year old in the summer of 1978 meant coming into contact with its Young Socialist wing, at that time dominated by … Continue reading →

Had I been asked, I might just as easily have suggested that Puccini was a fullback playing for Juventus as an Italian composer. To have done so would not have been entirely honest, I had encountered his name on BBC … Continue reading →