Sir, - Walking through our capital city today one becomes aware of what seems to me a great anomaly for a republic.
In a week when our President is in some ways closing a circle in our relationship with Britain with his State visit, Dublin’s streets are still teeming with signs of ascendancy and empire. On leaving Leinster House, for instance, a TD will walk down Molesworth Street, a thoroughfare that bears the name of Viscount Richard, whose allegiance was firmly to the kingdom of Great Britain.
Is Little Britain Street, in the north inner city, still a fitting title in a city that has been firmly Irish since 1922? Westmoreland Street? John Fane, once lord lieutenant, was a 10th Earl and a British Tory politician. Grafton, Henry Fitzroy, was the illegitimate son of Charles II and a deputy of William of Orange. His name, because of the street named after him, has lived on through centuries of Anglo-Irish turbulence.
Jervis, Marlborough and Leeson are others whose legacy is set in stone. Are these names essential to our identity, or is it time to take our streets back? Davitt, Stephens and Kickham Street might be more vital to a nation that, population-wise at least, has still not recovered fully from the Famine. Collins has an avenue, but surely he is more important to us than Westmoreland. And who better to kick Grafton into touch than Brian Boru? Yours, etc,
JODY MOYLAN,
The Paddocks,
Clontarf,
Dublin 3