The Revolutionary Generation in Ireland, 1890-1923: some thoughts on historian Roy Foster's new book, Vivid Faces

On the first of October, the Embassy hosted the London launch of Professor Roy Foster's new book, Vivid Faces: the revolutionary generation in Ireland, 1890-1923. Roy Foster is Carroll Professor of Irish History at the University of Oxford and a renowned and prolific historian of modern Ireland. Here is what I said at the book launch.

It is my pleasure to host this evening's event and to pay tribute to Roy Foster's immense contribution to Ireland's self-understanding. His many books have encouraged us to look afresh at our past and to see things from new angles. He has done Ireland a particular service as the biographer of our greatest poet, WB Yeats, a key figure in Ireland’s 19th and 20th century story.

As an enthusiastic reader of Irish history over many years, I think I understand the importance of the past as a compass for individuals and nations, enabling us to take our bearings against a rich, three-dimensional backdrop of previous human experience.

I have a particular interest in the period with which Roy Foster's latest book deals. The years between 1890 and 1923 have excited my interest ever since, as a student, I read the Christmas dinner scene in Joyce's Portrait of the Artist as a Young Man in which there are vivid, heated exchanges about the fall from grace of Charles Stewart Parnell in 1890. Joyce’s memorable writing offered me an invaluable insight into the intense political passions of late-19th century Ireland.

I was at primary school in 1966 when the 50th anniversary of the Easter Rising encouraged me to reflect on the sacrifice of its leaders and their motivations. Debate during the intervening decades about 1916 and its consequences has tended to focus on W.B. Yeats's question posed in the Rising's immediate aftermath:
Was it needless death after all?
For England may keep faith,
For all that is done and said.

The question of whether Home Rule would have been successfully delivered after World War 1 continues to generate public debate in Ireland? And, if so, would Home Rule ultimately have satisfied Ireland's national aspirations? This has been brought to a head by the centenary of the passage of the Home Rule Act of 1914.

In July at the Embassy, we paid tribute to the Home Rule generation, to Irish Party leader, John Redmond, and his fellow Home Rule M.P.s who represented Ireland at Westminster during a 50-year struggle to deliver self-government.

This evening, in launching Roy Foster's new book, I am happy to be able to pay tribute to the "revolutionary generation," who came into their own between 1890 and 1923, and who participated in and witnessed a transformation of Ireland from a province of the British Empire into an independent State on a divided island.

The genesis of the 'Irish revolution' of 1916-1923 is one of great conundrums of modern Irish history. How did it happen that a country destined in 1912 to embrace a future as a self-governed part of the British Empire was catapulted into six years of revolutionary turmoil resulting in independence for the Irish Free State being prised from a reluctant British Government?

Newly independent States were no novelty in the aftermath of the First World War, but this was usually a consequence of the collapse of the defeated German, Russian and Austro-Hungarian Empires. Only Ireland managed to obtain its freedom from a victorious European power still close to the pinnacle of its Imperial might.

There are at least two potential sets of explanations for this dramatic process of political change – (i) the play of external influence and (ii) the impact of internal Irish factors.

It is possible to see the First World War as the key driver of change in Ireland. After all, the leaders of the Easter Rising capitalised on the wartime situation to mount a challenge to British power in Ireland. We can also see the militarisation of Ireland before and after 1914 as a reflection of a zeitgeist that created the conditions for the outbreak and continuance of the First World War.

In searching for the roots of the transformation of Ireland in 1916-1923, we may also look at internal factors - the emergence of a new mentality in a rising generation who found themselves increasingly dissatisfied with the conservatism the Home Rule establishment. This is the focus of Vivid Faces, and Roy Foster does an excellent job in exploring their values and attitudes through the copious written record they left behind.

It was a generation whose concept of nationalism differed from that of the men (and the prominence of women in the new politics of the revolutionary period was one of indicators of generational change) of the Home Rule generation. The values of this younger breed were shaped by involvement in the Gaelic League, in literary and theatrical movements, and in nationalist political clubs. They appear to have been self-consciously rebellious and impatient seekers after new possibilities.

Roy Foster has paid our revolutionary generation the tribute of bringing their world view back to life in this book. He has done us a great service by enabling us to see beyond the leaders of the Rising, those lionised in Yeats's verse - MacDonagh and MacBride, Connolly and Pearse - the ones who 'stilled my childish play' in 1966. He has given us a chance to peer into the lives of the intriguing generation to which ‘the men of 1916’ belonged.

As we proceed through our decade of centenary commemorations, I hope that we can familiarise ourselves with the Ireland of 1912-1922 in all of its complexity, recognising the contribution of two sets of Irishmen and women who flourished during those years, the Home Rule Generation and the Revolutionary Generation with their ‘vivid faces’ brought into focus in Roy Foster’s book.

Daniel Mulhall is Ireland's Ambassador in London.