End of the World Book

Today Ireland s population is rising, immigration outpaces emigration, most families have two or at most three children, and full-time farmers are in steady decline. But the opposite was true for more than a century, from the great famine of the 1840s until the 1960s. Between 1922 and 1966 most of the first fifty years after independence the population of Ireland was falling, in the 1950s as rapidly as in the 1880s. Mary Daly s The Slow Failure examines not just the reasons for the decline, but the responses to it by politicians, academics, journalists, churchmen, and others who publicly agonized over their nation s slow failure. Eager to reverse population decline but fearful that economic development would undermine Irish national identity, they fashioned statistical evidence to support ultimately fruitless policies to encourage large, rural farm families. Focusing on both Irish government and society, Daly places Ireland s population history in the mainstream history of independent Ireland.
Daly s research reveals how pastoral visions of an ideal Ireland made it virtually impossible to reverse the fall in population. Promoting large families, for example, contributed to late marriages, actually slowing population growth further. The crucial issue of emigration failed to attract serious government attention except during World War II; successive Irish governments refused to provide welfare services for emigrants, leaving that role to the Catholic Church. Daly takes these and other elements of an often-sad story, weaving them into essential reading for understanding modern Irish history

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Author: Alistair McCartney
Publisher: University of Wisconsin Press
Published: 02/23/2006
Pages: 320
Binding Type: Hardcover
Weight: 1.24lbs
Size: 9.26h x 6.29w x 0.95d
ISBN: 9780299226305

Review Citation(s):
Publishers Weekly 02/11/2008 pg. 52
Library Journal 05/01/2008 pg. 57
Lambda Book Report 08/01/2008 pg. 31

About the Author
Alistair McCartney teaches creative writing at Antioch University in Los Angeles. His work has appeared in Fence, Bloom, James White Review, and other literary journals as well as in a number of fiction and creative nonfiction anthologies, including Wonderlands: Good Gay Travel Writing, published by the University of Wisconsin Press, and Between Men. Born in Australia, he lives in Los Angeles with his partner Tim Miller. This is his first novel. Finalist, PEN USA Literary Award in Fiction Award, PEN Center USA