Modern Ireland

This masterful blend of narrative and interpretation examines how key events in Irish history contributed to the creation of the "Irish Nation"

In Modern Ireland: 1600-1972, R.F. Foster provides a comprehensive and detailed overview of Irish history and key cultural, religious, and political events that shaped the country.

"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 TimesList of Maps
List of Tables
List of Figures
Preface
Acknowledgments

Part One
Prologue: Varieties of Irishness
Chapter One: 'Wild Shamrock Manners': Ireland in 1600
Chapter Two: 'Nationalism' and Recusancy
Chapter Three: Plantation: Theory and Practice
Chapter Four: Confederate Ireland
Chapter Five: Cromwellian Ireland
Chapter Six: Restoration Ireland
Chapter Seven: Shipwreck and Deliverance: The Foundations of Ascendancy

Part Two
Chapter Eight: The Ascendancy Mind
Chapter Nine: Economy, Society, and the 'Hidden' Ireland
Chapter Ten: The Structure of Politics
Chapter Eleven: Americans, Volunteers and the Politics of 'Patriotism'
Chapter Twelve: 'Enthusiasm Defying Punishment': Revolution, Republicanism and Reaction

Part Three
Chapter Thirteen: The Mobilization of Popular Politics
Chapter Fourteen: The Famine: Before and After
Chapter Fifteen: Ireland Abroad
Chapter Sixteen: Land, Politics and Nationalism
Chapter Seventeen: The Politics of Panellism

Part Four
Chapter Eighteen: The 'New' Nationalism
Chapter Nineteen: War and Revolution
Chapter Twenty: The Takeover
Chapter Twenty-one: In a Free State
Chapter Twenty-two: The de Valera Dispensation
Chapter Twenty-three: 'Modern' Ireland?

Appendix:
Proclamation of the Republic
Chronology
References
Bibliographical Essay
Index of Subjects
Index of Names

R. F. Foster is Carroll Professor of Irish History at the University of Oxford and a Fellow of Hertford College, Oxford. His books include The Irish Story and W. B. Yeats: A Life.