Description
Book SynopsisThis full-length biographical study - substantially rewritten and updated - of one of the most important women in Irish political life in the 20th century is now reissued by UCD Press. Hanna Sheehy Skeffington, part of a pioneering generation, played a significant role in the early Irish Republic. Hanna Sheehy Skeffington was a leading figure in the suffrage movement, she was an activist in the anti-war movement of 1914-18 and was an executive member of Sinn Fein. She opposed the Free State and provided consistent support for women's resistance to anti-women measures enacted by both Cumann na nGaedheal and Fianna Fail. Her later career saw her as an electoral candidate to the Dail in 1943 and she proved herself fearless in her fight for justice, confronting both the British Prime Minister and the President of the United States of America. Incorporating new archival research and featuring an array of newly discovered images, Ward brings to light previously unpublished material about Hanna's personal life: her relationship with her husband and her role as a single parent. This timely revised edition serves to highlight the fascinating life of a pivotal figure in feminist, labour and nationalist movements in Ireland.
Trade ReviewWard's book offers a vision of Irish feminism in its complexity, revealing the subtler and more nuanced relationships that crossed ideological differences, as well as the friendships and alliances among feminists in Ireland, England, America and Europe. Through close and devoted study of Hanna Sheehy Skeffington, scholars may see how all the theatrics of resistance - choreographies, stage business, the orchestration of shots, interruptions, heckling - is developed and transmuted. She remains a powerful feminist ancestor to study and admire. Lucy McDiarmid, Irish Literary Supplement It takes a book like this to remind us how women have been written out of mainstream Irish history. In this biography of Hanna Sheehy Skeffington she draws out of oblivion the history of Irish feminism in the first decades of this century. When one reads Margaret Ward's account of that period it is astounding that such consistent political action was omitted from Irish history. Ethna Viney, Irish Times ;Margaret Ward's biography of Hanna Sheehy Skeffington reveals her to have been a remarkable woman in her own right who established a militant suffrage movement in Ireland, supported the organization of women workers and went on to become a significant figure in Sinn Fein. Throughout her life Hanna faced the difficult task of balancing the claims of her feminism and her commitment to Irish independence. Margaret Ward gives a balanced account, sifting through stories and myths. Sheila Rowbotham, The Times; Margaret Ward is one of a number of women historians who have been engaged in excavating the history of women in Ireland and the history of Irish feminism. This biography is an important contribution to that process. ;Catriona Crowe, Sunday Tribune
Table of ContentsAcknowledgements
List of Illustrations
Family Tree
Chronology of Hanna Sheehy Skeffington’s Life and Times
Suffrage Friends and Colleagues of Hanna Sheehy Skeffington
1Early Years 1877–1900
2The Making of a Feminist 1900–1903
3Partnership 1903–1908
4A Feminist Mother 1908-1910
5The Stone and The Shillelagh 1910–1912
6Outlaws 1912–1914
7'Rolling Up the Map of Suffrage' 1914–1916
8Death of a Pacifist 1916
9Challenging the Empire 1917–1918
10A Feminist Sinn Féiner 1918–1921
11Republican Envoy 1921–1925
12The Struggle Continues 1925–1932
13Feminism, Republicanism, Communism 1932–1937
14‘The Seeds Beneath the Snow’ 1937–1946
Notes
Bibliography
Index
