Larry Hughes answers 13 questions in a Booker's Dozen.


TPQ: What are you currently reading?

LH: Just finished reading Carcass Trade … Detective fiction by Noreen Ayres. A fast-paced little paperback about undercover investigation in Orange County USA.

TPQ: Best and worst books you have ever read?

LH: The best are numerous. But in adulthood it would be Le Carre - The Tailor Of Panama and the Stieg Larrson trilogy - The Girl With The Dragon Tattoo - The Girl Who Played With Fire and The Girl Who Kicked The Hornet’s Nest.

Worst was a book recommended at university on the Thirty Years War which I was excited to order on Amazon and when it arrived, read like an appendix. It was a couple of hundred pages of back to back footnotes. Can’t remember the author or title. It is in my flat in Spain. I only remember the disappointment.

TPQ: Book most cherished as a child?

LH: Ladybird book Ned the Donkey …first book I read cover to cover and I thought I was great. So a word of warning… Don't Fuck With Ned. 

TPQ: Favourite Childhood author?

LH: Didn’t have one.

TPQ: First book to really own you?

LH: Of Mice and Men by Steinbeck … read it when I was about 14 and it was traumatic stuff. It shocked me: the cruelty of circumstance and ‘life’ I suppose. Around same time War And An Irish Town - Eamonn McCann. Michael Farrell wrote some good stuff too - The Orange State.

TPQ: Favourite male and female author?

LH: Male … I actually enjoyed Bill Bryson and his observations but not the ‘Big Bang’ A Short History of Nearly Everything. I put that down after a chapter or two and never went back to it. I also really enjoy Michael Moore. He rips it up. Jeremy Clarkson was funny too.

Female. The only one comes to mind is the book I just finished. Noreen Ayres. Wonder is she related to Pam Ayres the English poet? I don’t read Mills and Boon.


A Berlin Book Tower in memory of the Nazi book burning.

TPQ: A preference for fact or fiction?

LH: I like fact. I don’t like sci fi - bullshit reading. I like fact-based like Churchill And The Irish Marshals. Five of the seven British generals in WW2 were Irishmen. Historical, or if it is non- historical or biographical, then detective type novels. We had good men stayed home too. Guerilla Days in Ireland - Tom Barry.

TPQ: Biography, autobiography or memoir that most impressed you?

LH: Have to be Tom Crean or Paddy Blair Mayne. I love the way the Irish militarily excel in proper military outfits and both the British Empire and USA were wonderful theatres for the Irish in more recent years after the defeat of the Gaelic Irish Catholic order and the opportunities available in Catholic European armies of centuries earlier. Crean epitomized the ruggedness of the Irish for me. Mayne is a man after my own heart, 60 minute warning me bollix lol. Ned Kelly and Billy are eternal legends.

TPQ: Any author or book you point blank refuse to read?

LH: Probably Sci Fi or Bible thumpers like Paisley or the God Squad in the USA.

TPQ: A book to share with somebody so that they would more fully understand you?

LH: Bandit Country - Toby Harnden. That is where my heart will always be.

TPQ: Last book you gave as a present?

LH: American Terrorist … About Timothy McVeigh and the Oklahoma (fertilizer) Bombing. Gave it to my dad. I always meant to give him the Fall Of Singapore. He was in the RAF and we were stationed there in the late 1960s when I was very young and cute. It amused me to learn decades later that 130,000 Brits surrendered to 30,000 Japs on bicycles and with so little resistance. Just wanted to watch his wee face when I handed it to him. 

TPQ: Book you would most like to see turned into a movie?

LH: American Terrorist, I think, but done from the perspective of what the effects of endless wars against enemies ill equipped to defend themselves actually has upon not only those societies attacked but also upon professional soldiers who see first-hand the reality behind the jingo and what it does to so many of them.

TPQ: A "must read" you intend getting to before you die?

LH: I Haven’t identified it yet. Something detached from local Irish History of any era. Probably a political one of some sorts from Asia or Latin America. Those places are still very much on my radar. Maybe something about some of the Irish in the Catholic Spanish forces in Latin America. I know several did very well there. Please feel free to recommend.

Larry Hughes is a Globe trekking English teacher

Booker's Dozen @ Larry Hughes

Larry Hughes answers 13 questions in a Booker's Dozen.


TPQ: What are you currently reading?

LH: Just finished reading Carcass Trade … Detective fiction by Noreen Ayres. A fast-paced little paperback about undercover investigation in Orange County USA.

TPQ: Best and worst books you have ever read?

LH: The best are numerous. But in adulthood it would be Le Carre - The Tailor Of Panama and the Stieg Larrson trilogy - The Girl With The Dragon Tattoo - The Girl Who Played With Fire and The Girl Who Kicked The Hornet’s Nest.

Worst was a book recommended at university on the Thirty Years War which I was excited to order on Amazon and when it arrived, read like an appendix. It was a couple of hundred pages of back to back footnotes. Can’t remember the author or title. It is in my flat in Spain. I only remember the disappointment.

TPQ: Book most cherished as a child?

LH: Ladybird book Ned the Donkey …first book I read cover to cover and I thought I was great. So a word of warning… Don't Fuck With Ned. 

TPQ: Favourite Childhood author?

LH: Didn’t have one.

TPQ: First book to really own you?

LH: Of Mice and Men by Steinbeck … read it when I was about 14 and it was traumatic stuff. It shocked me: the cruelty of circumstance and ‘life’ I suppose. Around same time War And An Irish Town - Eamonn McCann. Michael Farrell wrote some good stuff too - The Orange State.

TPQ: Favourite male and female author?

LH: Male … I actually enjoyed Bill Bryson and his observations but not the ‘Big Bang’ A Short History of Nearly Everything. I put that down after a chapter or two and never went back to it. I also really enjoy Michael Moore. He rips it up. Jeremy Clarkson was funny too.

Female. The only one comes to mind is the book I just finished. Noreen Ayres. Wonder is she related to Pam Ayres the English poet? I don’t read Mills and Boon.


A Berlin Book Tower in memory of the Nazi book burning.

TPQ: A preference for fact or fiction?

LH: I like fact. I don’t like sci fi - bullshit reading. I like fact-based like Churchill And The Irish Marshals. Five of the seven British generals in WW2 were Irishmen. Historical, or if it is non- historical or biographical, then detective type novels. We had good men stayed home too. Guerilla Days in Ireland - Tom Barry.

TPQ: Biography, autobiography or memoir that most impressed you?

LH: Have to be Tom Crean or Paddy Blair Mayne. I love the way the Irish militarily excel in proper military outfits and both the British Empire and USA were wonderful theatres for the Irish in more recent years after the defeat of the Gaelic Irish Catholic order and the opportunities available in Catholic European armies of centuries earlier. Crean epitomized the ruggedness of the Irish for me. Mayne is a man after my own heart, 60 minute warning me bollix lol. Ned Kelly and Billy are eternal legends.

TPQ: Any author or book you point blank refuse to read?

LH: Probably Sci Fi or Bible thumpers like Paisley or the God Squad in the USA.

TPQ: A book to share with somebody so that they would more fully understand you?

LH: Bandit Country - Toby Harnden. That is where my heart will always be.

TPQ: Last book you gave as a present?

LH: American Terrorist … About Timothy McVeigh and the Oklahoma (fertilizer) Bombing. Gave it to my dad. I always meant to give him the Fall Of Singapore. He was in the RAF and we were stationed there in the late 1960s when I was very young and cute. It amused me to learn decades later that 130,000 Brits surrendered to 30,000 Japs on bicycles and with so little resistance. Just wanted to watch his wee face when I handed it to him. 

TPQ: Book you would most like to see turned into a movie?

LH: American Terrorist, I think, but done from the perspective of what the effects of endless wars against enemies ill equipped to defend themselves actually has upon not only those societies attacked but also upon professional soldiers who see first-hand the reality behind the jingo and what it does to so many of them.

TPQ: A "must read" you intend getting to before you die?

LH: I Haven’t identified it yet. Something detached from local Irish History of any era. Probably a political one of some sorts from Asia or Latin America. Those places are still very much on my radar. Maybe something about some of the Irish in the Catholic Spanish forces in Latin America. I know several did very well there. Please feel free to recommend.

Larry Hughes is a Globe trekking English teacher

7 comments:

  1. Must admit to missing having you around the Quill Larry!

    ReplyDelete
  2. Interesting take on Irishmen fighting for other nations and empires. Their role helped the sacking of vulnerable nations like our own, keeping them under subjugation with terror.

    What Connolly wrote in 1898 should be cautionary advice for those wishing to join a foreign army today. The same principles apply.

    "We gather from the American newspapers that our countrymen in the United States army and navy have been highly distinguishing themselves in the cause of the war with Spain.

    This is as it should be and in consonance with all our Irish traditions. We are a fighting race, we are told, and every Irishman is always proud to hear our politicians and journalists tell of our exploits in the fighting line – in other countries, in other climes and in other times.

    Yes, we are a fighting race. Whether it is under the Stars and Stripes or under the Union Jack; planting the flag of America over the walls of Santiago or helping our own oppressors to extend their hated rule over other unfortunate nations our brave Irish boys are ever to the front.

    When the Boer has to be robbed of his freedom, the Egyptian has to be hurled back under the heel of his taskmaster, the Zulu to be dynamited in his caves, the Matabele slaughtered beside the ruins of his smoking village or Afridi to be hunted from his desolated homestead, wheresoever, in short, the bloody standard of the oppressors of Ireland is to be found over some unusually atrocious piece of scoundrelism, look then for the sons of our Emerald Isle, and under the red coats of the hired assassin army you will find them.

    Yes, we are a fighting race. In Africa, India or America, wherever blood is to be spilt, there you will find Irishmen, eager and anxious for a fight, under any flag, in anybody's quarrel, in any cause – except their own.

    In that cause, for our own freedom and own land, we have for the last century consistently refused to fight. On any other part of the earth's surface we can shed our blood with the blessing of Mother Church and the prayers of the faithful to strengthen our arms, but in Ireland and for the freedom of the Irish people.

    Anathema."

    ReplyDelete
  3. Simon

    "In that cause, for our own freedom and own land, we have for thr last century conssistently refusewd to fighjt."

    So was the Ezaster Rising, the 191-21 War of Independecne or TYroubles, the 1956-62 Border Campaign, the Provisionals' Long War just manufactured images then.

    This from a nmon-fighting Irishman and proud of it.

    ReplyDelete
  4. Barry, that was a quote from James Connolly in 1898 on the anniversary of the first Republican rising by the United Irishmen.

    ReplyDelete
  5. Larry Hughes says

    Regards Steve - from Donegal Liberated Zone LOL

    ReplyDelete
    Replies
    1. LoL! Hope your well mucker and enjoying a few refreshing Ales!

      Delete
  6. Larry - it must have broken your heart having to be serious for once! Oddly enough the ones you wouldn't read fascinate - the God Squad in the USA. I read a lot about those people for the fact that they are dangerous and I often reflect how religion does this to people. Something that can get you to believe the world is 6000 years old and that evolution is a myth might just get you to subscribe to more murderous crazy beliefs. Thanks for that Larry - a great addition to the collection.

    ReplyDelete