MATTHEW HAWKINS applauds a psychotherapist’s disection of William Blake
Rita’s education
RICHARD RUDKIN recommends the extraordinary memoir of the late republican activist and politician, Rita O’Hare
Seven provisional IRA staff officers are among a group who escaped from the prison ship Maidstone in Belfast, January 24 1972. Speaking at a press conference are (l-r) Thomas Toland, 25, Thomas Kane, 24, Thomas Gorman, 26, IRA Chief of Staff Sean McStiotain, Rita O'Hare, Joe Cahill, Martin Taylor, 21, Peter Rodgers, 17, Sean Convery, 31, and James Bryson, 23.
[PA archive] 
New releases from Christina Alden and Alex Patterson, Odette Michell, Clementine Lovell
JOHN GREEN is fascinated by a very readable account of Britain’s involvement in South America
Strip cartoons used to be the bread and butter of newspapers and they have been around for centuries. MICHAL BONCZA asks our own Paul Tanner about which bees are in his bonnet
GORDON PARSONS acknowledges the authority with which Sarah Kane’s theatrical justification for suicide has resonance today
RON JACOBS welcomes a timely homage to one of the IWW and CPUSA’s most effective orators
Rita - A Memoir
Rita O’Hare, Greenisland Press, £18
AS a former British soldier who was in the North of Ireland in the early 1970s, I have read many accounts from those involved in the Troubles, including former military personnel. Every now and again, a book emerges that stands out from the rest. Rita — A Memoir is one such book.
The life of Rita O’Hare was a remarkable one. Born in 1943 to a Protestant mother and a Catholic father who joined the Communist Party aged 17, Rita grew up in the middle-class area of Andersonstown, West Belfast.
Similar stories
From colonialism to the Troubles, the story of England’s first colony is one of exploitation, resistance, and solidarity — and one we should fight to ensure is told, writes teacher ROBERT POOLE
Remembering a dedicated T&GWU activist, internationalist and anti-sectarian