{"product_id":"the-politics-of-memoir-and-the-northern-ireland-conflict-9781786940148","title":"The Politics of Memoir and the Northern Ireland","description":"\u003cb\u003eBook Synopsis\u003c\/b\u003e\u003cbr\u003eThis book examines memoir-writing by many of the key political actors in the Northern Irish ‘Troubles’ (1969–1998), and argues that memoir has been a neglected dimension of the study of the legacies of the violent conflict. It investigates these sources in the context of ongoing disputes over how to interpret Northern Ireland’s recent past. A careful reading of these memoirs can provide insights into the lived experience and retrospective judgments of some of the main protagonists of the conflict. The period of relative peace rests upon an uneasy calm in Northern Ireland. Many people continue to inhabit contested ideological territories, and in their strategies for shaping the narrative ‘telling’ of the conflict, key individuals within the Protestant Unionist and Catholic Irish Nationalist communities can appear locked into exclusive and self-justifying discourses. In such circumstances, while some memoirists have been genuinely self-critical, many others have utilised a post-conflict language of societal reconciliation in order to mask a strategy that actually seeks to score rhetorical victories and to discomfort traditional enemies. Memoir-writing is only one dimension of the current ad hoc approach to ‘dealing with the past’ in Northern Ireland, but in the absence of any consensus regarding an overarching ‘truth and reconciliation’ process, this is likely to be the pattern for the foreseeable future. This study provides the first comprehensive analysis of a major resource for understanding the conflict.\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003e\u003cb\u003eTrade Review\u003c\/b\u003e\u003cbr\u003eReviews 'Written in a clear, uncluttered style, this is an important work that provides the first comprehensive analysis of the importance of memoir in understanding the conflict in Northern Ireland.'\u003cbr\u003e Henry Patterson, University of Ulster\u003cbr\u003e'A short yet comprehensive account of Troubles-related memoir that can benefit anyone who wants to read about Northern Ireland’s recent history.'\u003cbr\u003e Malachi O'Doherty, \u003ci\u003eThe Irish Times\u003c\/i\u003e\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003e\u003cb\u003eTable of Contents\u003c\/b\u003e\u003cbr\u003e\u003cul\u003e\n\u003cli\u003eAcknowledgements x\u003c\/li\u003e\n\u003cli\u003e1 The Study of Political Memoir and the Legacy of the Conflict in Northern Ireland\u003c\/li\u003e\n\u003cli\u003eIntroduction\u003c\/li\u003e\n\u003cli\u003eThe Politics of Memoir: Establishing the Parameters of Study\u003c\/li\u003e\n\u003cli\u003eThe Construction and Narration of Exemplary Lives\u003c\/li\u003e\n\u003cli\u003eThe History of an Individual’s Soul: Truth and Memory in Life-Writing\u003c\/li\u003e\n\u003cli\u003e2 Provisional Republican Memoir-Writing\u003c\/li\u003e\n\u003cli\u003eIntroduction\u003c\/li\u003e\n\u003cli\u003eBecoming a Provo: Narratives of Belonging\u003c\/li\u003e\n\u003cli\u003eDifferent Worlds of the Troubles: Locality and Internal Republican Politics\u003c\/li\u003e\n\u003cli\u003e3 Departing the Republican Movement: Memoir-Writing and the Politics of Dissent\u003c\/li\u003e\n\u003cli\u003eIntroduction\u003c\/li\u003e\n\u003cli\u003eExplaining the Break: Dissent or Disavowal?\u003c\/li\u003e\n\u003cli\u003e4 Loyalist Paramilitarism and the Politics of Memoir-Writing\u003c\/li\u003e\n\u003cli\u003eIntroduction: A New Phenomenon?\u003c\/li\u003e\n\u003cli\u003eA Line in the Sand? Authorial Motivation and Loyalist Paramilitary Memoir\u003c\/li\u003e\n\u003cli\u003eA Confusion of Voices: Author and Subject in Loyalist Life-Writing\u003c\/li\u003e\n\u003cli\u003eAn Enclosed World? Localism and Loyalist Memoir-Writing Loyalists, Life-Writing and Motivation: Exploitation or\u003c\/li\u003e\n\u003cli\u003eReconciliation?\u003c\/li\u003e\n\u003cli\u003eConclusion\u003c\/li\u003e\n\u003cli\u003e5 Memoir-Writing and Moderation? Ulster Unionists Face the Troubles\u003c\/li\u003e\n\u003cli\u003eIntroduction\u003c\/li\u003e\n\u003cli\u003eUnionists and Reform: O’Neill and Narratives of Frustration\u003c\/li\u003e\n\u003cli\u003eReflections on Unionist Political Division: O’Neill and Faulkner\u003c\/li\u003e\n\u003cli\u003e6 Northern Nationalists and Memoir-Writing: The Social Democratic and Labour Party and the Troubles\u003c\/li\u003e\n\u003cli\u003eRejecting Republicanism?\u003c\/li\u003e\n\u003cli\u003eA Paradigm Shift? Civil Rights and the Attitude to Unionism\u003c\/li\u003e\n\u003cli\u003eThe SDLP and the Troubles\u003c\/li\u003e\n\u003cli\u003e7 A Case-Study of Memoir-Writing and the Elusive Search for a Political Settlement: The 1974 Power-Sharing Executive and\u003c\/li\u003e\n\u003cli\u003eSunningdale\u003c\/li\u003e\n\u003cli\u003eIntroduction\u003c\/li\u003e\n\u003cli\u003eHope and Hesitation\u003c\/li\u003e\n\u003cli\u003e‘A Government of All the Talents’\u003c\/li\u003e\n\u003cli\u003eThe Ulster Workers’ Council Strike: ‘A Nightmarish, Surreal Experience’\u003c\/li\u003e\n\u003cli\u003e8 British Ministers and the Politics of Northern Ireland: Reading the Political Memoirs of Secretaries of State\u003c\/li\u003e\n\u003cli\u003eIntroduction\u003c\/li\u003e\n\u003cli\u003eThe Experience of Northern Ireland: Marginal or Central?\u003c\/li\u003e\n\u003cli\u003eWelcome to Belfast, Minister! Appointing the Secretary of State\u003c\/li\u003e\n\u003cli\u003eThe ‘Loneliness of the Northern Ireland Secretary’: Reflecting on Policy-Making as SOSNI\u003c\/li\u003e\n\u003cli\u003eWorking with the Northern Irish Parties\u003c\/li\u003e\n\u003cli\u003eConclusion\u003c\/li\u003e\n\u003cli\u003e9 Journalists, the Northern Ireland ‘Troubles’ and the Politics of Memoir-Writing\u003c\/li\u003e\n\u003cli\u003eIntroduction\u003c\/li\u003e\n\u003cli\u003eMy War Gone by, I Miss it so …\u003c\/li\u003e\n\u003cli\u003e‘Blow-Ins’ and Belfastmen\u003c\/li\u003e\n\u003cli\u003eForgive Us Our Press Passes: Political Space and Journalism\u003c\/li\u003e\n\u003cli\u003eConfronting the Past: Distance and Denial\u003c\/li\u003e\n\u003cli\u003eTelling the Story and Telling one’s Story\u003c\/li\u003e\n\u003cli\u003eReflections on Reporting Political Violence\u003c\/li\u003e\n\u003cli\u003eConclusion\u003c\/li\u003e\n\u003cli\u003e10 Victims and Memoir-Writing: Leaving the Troubles Behind?\u003c\/li\u003e\n\u003cli\u003eIntroduction\u003c\/li\u003e\n\u003cli\u003eInsiders and Outsiders: The ‘Different Worlds’ of the Troubles\u003c\/li\u003e\n\u003cli\u003eMemoir-Writing and the Question of Timing\u003c\/li\u003e\n\u003cli\u003eVictims and Perpetrators: Towards Understanding?\u003c\/li\u003e\n\u003cli\u003eConclusion\u003c\/li\u003e\n\u003cli\u003e11 Chroniclers of the Conflict\u003c\/li\u003e\n\u003cli\u003eNotes and references\u003c\/li\u003e\n\u003cli\u003eBibliography\u003c\/li\u003e\n\u003cli\u003eIndex\u003c\/li\u003e\n\u003c\/ul\u003e","brand":"Liverpool University Press","offers":[{"title":"Default Title","offer_id":51360121782615,"sku":"9781786940148","price":29.69,"currency_code":"GBP","in_stock":true}],"thumbnail_url":"\/\/cdn.shopify.com\/s\/files\/1\/0817\/1739\/5799\/files\/9781786940148.jpg?v=1754126730","url":"https:\/\/bookcurl.com\/products\/the-politics-of-memoir-and-the-northern-ireland-conflict-9781786940148","provider":"Book Curl","version":"1.0","type":"link"}