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Fiona O'Connor
dream web
Literature / 29 April 2025
29 April 2025

FIONA O’CONNOR steps warily through a novel that skewers many of the exposed flanks of the over-privileged

A civilian casualty of war in Iraq lost both legs
Books / 14 April 2025
14 April 2025
A uncomfortably misogynistic authorial voice that sometimes seems to lack insight troubles FIONA O’CONNOR
A GREAT TEACHER: Fredric Jameson speaking at the Brazilian c
Books / 18 February 2025
18 February 2025
FIONA O’CONNOR recommends an accessible and entertaining survey of post-war French philosophy and its relation to contemporary capitalism
The four new tower blocks built around Deansgate Square domi
Book Review / 12 December 2024
12 December 2024
FIONA O’CONNOR admires a collection that is a riposte to the armies of developers, estate agents, private capital speculators and their marketeers
POACHER TURNED GAMEKEEPER? Jess Phillips MP holds the Sue Gr
Books / 5 September 2024
5 September 2024
FIONA O’CONNOR examines a new book by Labour’s media-savvy MP and new Under-Secretary of State for Safeguarding and Violence Against Women and Girls
DOUBLE BIND: A woman working from home during the pandemic
Book Review / 28 August 2024
28 August 2024
FIONA O'CONNOR endorses an examination of how current neoliberal policies sweep social care and welfare burdens into hidden abodes and increase exploitative pressures, particularly on working-class women
AGAINST BRAINWASHING: (L) Magdalen Laundry in Ireland, early
Appreciation / 6 August 2024
6 August 2024
FIONA O’CONNOR treasures the work of Edna O’Brien for the depth of evocation of psychologies, desires and losses among ordinary lives
Irish peasants, 1880
Books Review / 13 June 2024
13 June 2024
FIONA O’CONNOR relishes the revelation that capitalist assumptions are fundamentally different to the peasant’s relation to the land 
HORROR IN GAZA: Palestinians pray over a mass grave, in Khan
Books / 23 November 2023
23 November 2023
What better guide for our times, say FIONA O’CONNOR than the example of remarkable women who thought through the experience of WWII
MEMORABLE: (L to R): Gertrude Stein in 1905 by Pablo Picasso
Book Review / 5 May 2023
5 May 2023
FIONA O’CONNOR marvels at a highly original collection of essays that explores the changing status and the meanings made by women’s voices
FEARLESS: Dubravka Ugresic, Netherlands 1992
Obituary / 10 April 2023
10 April 2023
FIONA O’CONNOR calls attention to the achievement of a great Yugoslav exponent of intelligent, fearless humanitarianism
The Trans-Siberian stops at Omsk
Book Review / 21 August 2022
21 August 2022
FIONA O’CONNOR recommends two novels telling of real contemporary experiences that question the nature of liberty and fraternity in present times
Route 92
Book Review / 19 August 2021
19 August 2021
Mining the momentous in mundane journeys through French capital
SINGULAR ACHIEVEMENT: (Above) The Rape Hurts Foundation (RHF
BOOKS / 24 June 2021
24 June 2021
Timely counsel from the worldly wise
THE ALGORITHM GODS: As Marx saw in Capital, new technologies
BOOKS / 31 May 2021
31 May 2021
Acute observations on growing deployment of artificial intelligence and automation in the workplace
FORMIDABLE INTELLIGENCE: Noemi Lefebvre
FICTION / 11 May 2021
11 May 2021
Mordant reflections on a France veering rightwards
THE INSPIRER: poet Paul Muldoon
Culture / 10 March 2021
10 March 2021
Solace for troubled soul in Ireland’s natural world
BOOKS / 2 March 2021
2 March 2021
Acute observations on women’s experience from a veteran radical
SHAPING THINGS TO COME: A 3-D printer
BOOKS / 10 January 2021
10 January 2021
Why the new machine age promised by artificial intelligence and digitital technology is a myth
NATIONAL TREASURE: Seamus Heaney
POETRY / 3 September 2020
3 September 2020
RF Foster takes the measure of one of the most powerful wordsmiths of the 20th century
BOOKS / 10 July 2020
10 July 2020
Challenging essays on sex and reactionary morality
BOOKS / 3 July 2020
3 July 2020
Grim reality of unbridled free-market policies for US poor
People carrying various signs gather outside The Custom Hous
Features / 28 March 2018
28 March 2018
In May this year Irish citizens will vote in a referendum on abortion rights. FIONA O’CONNOR explains how her new play seeks to encourage women to make sure they vote for their right to choose