In 2017, in the west of Ireland, the remains of almost 800 children were found in a mass grave. Shocking as the discovery was, few were surprised. The bones of several children had, in fact, been uncovered in 1975 by two boys playing in an orchard where the Bon Secours Mother and Baby Home — a Catholic institution for “fallen” women and their infants — had once stood. In what now seems a cruel metaphor for a culture of devout denial, the site had been blessed by a priest and covered up again.
In countless ways, the story of modern Ireland is the story of covering things up that don’t fit the national myth — with devastating consequences for many. In We Don’t Know Ourselves: A Personal History of Modern Ireland, the Irish Times critic Fintan O’Toole unpacks this truth with passion and smouldering rage. Although set an ocean away, the book holds lessons, about national...
David Dunne is an Irish Canadian author whose titles include Design Thinking at Work. He is currently writing a book about the Irish border region.
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