Kirjahaku

Whist was a wildly popular card game in the late 19th century--so popular that it was almost one's social duty to become an accomplished Whist player. Among the most reliable authorities and instructors was R.F. Foster, who developed a "No book has won more popularity among the Whist-loving community than Foster's Whist Manual." -- Boston Herald, April 1894 "[Foster's] method of teaching the beginner is simple, lucid, and progressive, and his rules concise, yet clear. Not only beginners, but also advanced players might profitably enter upon his studies." - The Milwaukee Whist Club

Masterfully blending narrative and interpretation, and R.F. Foster's Modern Ireland: 1600-1972 looks at how key events in Irish history contributed to the creation of the 'Irish Nation'. 'The most brilliant and courageous Irish historian of his generation' Colm Tóibín, London Review of Books 'Remarkable ... Foster gives a wise and balanced account of both forces of unity and forces of diversity ... a master work of scholarship' Bernard Crick, New Statesman 'A tour de force ... Anyone who really wants to make sense of Ireland and the Irish must read Roy Foster's magnificent and accessible Modern Ireland' Anthony Clare 'A magnificent book. It supersedes all other accounts of modern Irish history' Conor Cruise O'Brien, Sunday Times 'Dazzling ... a masterly survey not so much of the events of Irish history over the past four centuries as of the way in which those events acted upon the peoples living in Ireland to produce in our own time an "Irish Nation" ... a gigantic and distinguished undertaking' Robert Kee, Observer 'A work of gigantic importance. It is everything that a history book should be. It is beautifully and clearly written; it seeps wisdom through its every pore; it is full of the most elegant and scholarly insights; it is magnificently authoritative and confident ... Modern Ireland is quite simply the single most important book on Irish history written in this generation ... A masterpiece' Kevin Myers, Irish Times R. F. Foster is Carroll Professor of Irish History at the University of Oxford and a Fellow of Hertford College, Oxford. His books include Modern Ireland: 1600-1972, Luck and the Irish and W. B. Yeats: A Life.

R.F. Foster's The Irish Story: Telling Tales and Making it Up in Ireland examines how key events in Irish history have been recast and retold to serve a multiplicity of purposes. In this provocative and extremely funny book Roy Foster demolishes the clichés that surround Ireland's past, examining how key moments have been turned into myths - and, more recently, airbrushed and repackaged for Hollywood and popular culture. Whether discussing the 'misery tourism' of Famine theme parks, ideas of mystical Celticism, the contested 'Irishness' of Yeats or the sentimentalized childhoods of Angela's Ashes and Gerry Adams's memoir, The Irish Story brilliantly separates the tall tales from the truth. 'Brilliantly scathing ... combative, incisive and immensely enjoyable' Fintan O'Toole, Irish Times 'Inspirational ... challenging, illuminating and witty' Antonia Fraser, Irish Times Books of the Year 'Very funny ... the Irish story has rarely received so lively and unbiased an unfolding' Patricia Craig, Independent 'A complex and supremely intelligent revision of Irish identity' Colm Tóibín, Independent Books of the Year 'Blazingly good ... lucid and elegant' John Lloyd, Financial Times R. F. Foster is Carroll Professor of Irish History at the University of Oxford and a Fellow of Hertford College, Oxford. His books include Modern Ireland: 1600-1972, Luck and the Irish and W. B. Yeats: A Life.

R.F. Foster's Luck and the Irish: A Brief History of Change, 1970-2000 examines how the country has weathered thirty years of rapid transformation, and what these changes may mean in the long run. From 1970, things were changing in Ireland - the Celtic Tiger had finally woken, and the rules for everything from gender roles and religion to international relations were being entirely rewritten. By the end of the twentieth century, Ireland had become a global brand, and the almost completely unexpected wave of prosperity had brought with it upheavals in economics, sexual mores and culture, as well as a shift in North-South attitudes. Roy Foster also looks at how characters as diverse as Gerry Adams, Mary Robinson, Charles Haughey and Bob Geldof have contributed to Ireland's altered psyche, and uncovers some of the scandals, corruption and marketing masterminds that have transformed Ireland - and its luck. 'Examines our society with fierce intelligence and insight' Colm Tóibín, Irish Times Books of the Year 'Occasionally angry, sometimes whimsical and frequently hilarious ... Appeals both to those who know nothing and those who think they know everything' Conor Gearty, Financial Times 'The brilliance of the writing places him as a historian in a league of his own ... A balanced work offering his own distinctive, original and elegant insights' Diarmaid Ferriter, Times Literary Supplement R. F. Foster is Carroll Professor of Irish History at the University of Oxford and a Fellow of Hertford College, Oxford. His books include Modern Ireland: 1600-1972, The Irish Story and W. B. Yeats: A Life.

OBSERVER BOOKS OF THE YEAR 2015TIMES LITERARY SUPPLEMENT BOOKS OF THE YEAR and OBSERVER BOOKS OF THE YEAR 2014WINNER OF THE AMERICAN HISTORICAL ASSOCIATION'S MORRIS D. FORKOSCH PRIZE 2016'The most complete and plausible exploration of the roots of the 1916 Rebellion... essential reading' Colm TóibínVivid Faces surveys the lives and beliefs of the people who made the Irish Revolution: linked together by youth, radicalism, subversive activities, enthusiasm and love. Determined to reconstruct the world and defining themselves against their parents, they were in several senses a revolutionary generation.The Ireland that eventually emerged bore little relation to the brave new world they had conjured up in student societies, agit-prop theatre groups, vegetarian restaurants, feminist collectives, volunteer militias, Irish-language summer schools, and radical newspaper offices. Roy Foster's book investigates that world, and the extraordinary people who occupied it. Looking back from old age, one of the most magnetic members of the revolutionary generation reflected that 'the phoenix of our youth has fluttered to earth a miserable old hen', but he also wondered 'how many people nowadays get so much fun as we did'. Working from a rich trawl of contemporary diaries, letters and reflections, Vivid Faces re-creates the argumentative, exciting, subversive and original lives of people who made a revolution, as well as the disillusionment in which it ended.

Charles Stewart Parnell has traditionally been studied from the political angle but here Foster places him in the social context of 19th century Irish gentry, and studies him in relation to his remarkable family. Beginning with a survey of the social milieu into which Parnell was born, he traces the foundation of the family's eminence in Irish life, and explores the ways in which Parnell's connections exerted a much more decisive influence than has previously been realised. Foster's conclusions supply a new appreciation of major aspects of Parnell's political life and of the motivations which governed his ostensibly contradictory personal life, which ended in the 'Mrs. O'Shea' divorce scandal, the ruin of his career, and of Irish hopes of independence for a generation. This study gives us a new picture of the man, and of his world. 'A very valuable, pioneering study.' Conor Cruise O'Brien