IF historical provenance lends weight to an argument, then Kilkenny's claim to a university for the south east is a strong one indeed. Plans to found a university in the Marble City date as far back as 1689-90; even further track - to 1677 - if one includes a petition to Charles II for a "New College" in the city at that time.
John Leonard's slim volume, A University for Kilkenny (St Canice's Press, £4.95), tells the story of those early plans, packing an amazing amount of information into just over seventy pages. Kilkenny, it appears, was already a centre of education in the 16th century, the first grammar school in Ireland (Kilkenny College) having been established there in 1538 by Piers Butler and his wife Margaret (FitzGerald), the Earl and Countess of Ormond. The Jesuits set up a college and novitiate in the Irishtown area in the early 1640s, in keeping with one of the aims of the Confederate Parliament, which was meant to promote the higher education of Catholic youth. This project was shortlived as this and other schools in the city were closed down by Cromwell in 1650.
It was John Parry, the Church of Ireland Bishop of Ossory, who petitioned Charles II in 1677 for the establishment of a second college of the University of Dublin in Kilkenny, timing it to coincide with the appointment of Ormond as Lord Lieutenant. Unfortunately for Kilkenny, the petition came to naught - within a year of its presentation there was a new Church of Ireland Bishop of Ossory and a new Lord Lieutenant of Ireland.
The accession of James II to the throne provided the opportunity for a third attempt to have a university in Kilkenny, this time combining it with a medical school. This Royal College of Physicians was given a royal warrant in 1687 but the college seems never to have opened. However, a Catholic Royal College of St Canice did start up in the following year and flourished for a time. When James wintered in Kilkenny in 1689-90 he granted this college a charter which elevated it to the status of a university. Then came William, the Battle of the Boyne and James's overthrow. The university project went with him.
John Leonard's little hook thoroughly researched and nicely illustrated, should prove a formidable weapon in the armoury of any group advocating Kilkenny as a potential centre for third level education.
A Catholic university was also the objective of two, 19th century ecclesiastics, Paul Cardinal Cullen, Archbishop of Dublin, and John Henry Cardinal Newman, who together established such a university at 86 St Stephen's Green, Dublin, in 1854. Fr Anthony Gaughan, in his even slimmer book, Newman's University Church (Kingdom Books, £9), presents a profusely illustrated monograph on the beautiful church which was built as part of that Catholic university. As with every subject which he touches, Fr Gaughan's study of University Church is detailed and delicate. He includes a background to the establishment of the university; descriptions of the architectural and artistic features of the church, even a "life" of Newman in haiku. The book is splendidly illustrated with many full colour and monochrome photographs and there is a good bibliography. It is well worth the price.
The publishing history of Colman O Mahony's fine volume on Cork life over 200 years, In the Shadows: Life in Cork 1750-1930 (Tower Books, £27.50), is almost as interesting as the book itself. Unsuccessful in getting grants to help publication, the author raised a certain amount of finance from local companies and individuals but was forced to limit his print order to 300 hardback copies. According to the author and publisher, fewer than 75 copies remain unsold - a tribute to the value and appeal of the book. The author says he spent about twenty years researching this work, mainly in old Cork newspapers and out of print books and pamphlets. The result speaks for itself - this is an exhaustingly annotated record of life in Cork city it's densely packed pages laden with facts and figures, Statistics and excerpts from newspapers.
The city's poor, its prostitutes, its piggeries ("There was "a dung yard called Rosetta ... where wandering pigs were kept after capture on the streets"), its workhouse (taking up several chapters) and its development and improvement in the 20th century, are all chronicled with dedication and a wealth of footnotes. There is an appendix with details of 380 executions from 1712 to 1923 (arranged alphabetically rather than chronologically) and numerous illustrations (at the back). It is a book, primarily, for Cork historians but may attract a wider readership because of its scope. But hurry.
LIAM O'DONNELL's paperback, The Days of the Servant Boy (Mercier Press, £7.99), is also based in Co Cork and describes, in unadorned prose, the time of the hiring fairs in the first half of this century. O'Donnell's accurate descriptions of farm life and activities, characters and leisure pursuits are laced with humour and free from sentimentality. As a record of a phase in Irish rural life this is a valuable contribution from a natural storyteller.
With the approach of the bicentenary of the 1798 Rising - and an educational deficit among many Irish people about the events and participants in that rising - Michael O'Flanagan's book about the leaders of the revolution, When They Followed Henry Joy (Riposte Books, £7.50), is both timely and useful. Here are short sketches of James Hope, Samuel Neilson, Lord Edward FitzGerald, Wolfe Tone, McCracken, Henry Munro, Thomas Russell, the Emmets, Oliver Bond, Simon Butler, William McNevin and Arthur O'Connor. The brevity of the sketches had not led to omission of essential facts; indeed, the hook Is replete with information about these revolutionary's and the events in which they, played such vital roles. The volume is recommended as an introduction to further reading on this seminal period in Irish history.