Vision of a better Ireland at Tomás Ághas book launch
IF James Connolly and Tomás Ághas had lived long enought to play a part in the nation building that followed Ireland’s War of Independence we would have a more just society today, socialist firebrand Joe Higgins from Lispole said as he launched Micheál Ó Moráin’s book on Tomás Ághas in An Díseart on Saturday.
The Fresco Room in An Díseart was packed to the door and beyond as Joe Higgins argued that Ashe, with his social awareness and Connolly, with his socialist principles, would have tempered the narrow conseratism ushered in by the Free State government and perpetuated by successive governments since then. It could have meant that we wouldn’t have the nightmare of divisionism, Catholic and Protestant workers iin the North would have united and control might not have been handed over to bankers to wreck our society and heap austerity on the people.
Lauding the work of Micheál Ó Moráin and excoriating those who would sideline figures like Tomás Ághas, Joe added: “Let us write the real history of our country, which has been put into the shade by powerful elites with a vested agenda.”
He declared the book officially launched, more speeches and the singing of songs followed and when a silence finally descended there was a rush for signed copies of the book, which kept Micheál writing at a furious pace.
Speaking later to The Kerryman, Michel said his book, which was first published in 1985, followed on from an earlier publication, entitled ‘I Die in a Good Cause’, by Seán Ó Lúing from Ballyferriter.
His initial motivation in writing the book was to claim for Tomás Ághas his rightful place in Irish history. “When we were doing the history of 1916 at school you got the impression that nothing happened outside of Dublin city. I felt Tomás Ághas was written out of history and wanted to do something to keep his memory alive,” he said.
Micheál also wanted to present a more balanced account of the events of 1916. He points out, for example, that in Tomás Ághas’s victorious Battle of Ashbourne all but one of those killed was Irish. “The RIC were Irish as well, and no less Irish than the people on the other side... People joined the RIC and British Army because they needed a job and we shouldn’t think less of them for making that choice,” he said.
Well over 200 copies of Micheál’s book were sold on Saturday – both at the launch and later by Joe Ó hAiniféin who brought copies around to some of the pubs in Dingle. Those sales will cover much of the cost of producing the book and any future profits will go towards the €15,000 cost of a bust of Tomás Ághas by sculptor Paul D’Arcy, which will be unveilled in Kinard on September 23. The book is available in the Cafe Liteartha and the Educational Shop in Dingle, Keane’s in Lispole, Kate’s Cross shop in Garrynadur and Polymath Bookshop in Tralee.