Sir, - In her column of August 25th, Nuala O'Faolain dismisses as an "idea", hidden away in the hearts and minds of "anti-partitionists", the notion of an "Ireland, now divided in two, which was once all one". I feel it is necessary to point out the obvious: this is not a woolly nationalist idea; this is historical chronology.
She goes on to state that "the big influences on popular culture and entertainment in the North come from England and not from the Republic." Ironically, the same is frequently true of the Republic itself (or are we to understand that the teenagers in Ms O'Faolain's neighbourhood have spurned Premiership football and Oasis for road-bowling and Scor na nOg?). Partition, according to Ms O'Faolain, is a cultural fact. On the evidence of her column, it seems that much of the problem has been dreamt into existence by herself.
Finally, Ms O'Faolain's brash statement that "being Northern or Southern is a primary mark, like being male or female or young or old or rural or urban or black or white" is astonishing. Surely any serious discussion of the national question should have no place for such dizzy sexist, ageist, and racist analogies. - Yours, etc., MICHAEL GRIFFIN,
Balliol College, Oxford.