GAVIN O’TOOLE welcomes a bold feminist subversion of classic folktales that are ubiquitous in the Irish imagination
Bonding with others offers a level of freedom and strength
A recognition that individually we are powerless both politically and socially is essential, writes GORDON PARSONS
FEAR OF MULTITUDES: Policing overkill at a pro-Palestine march on March 23 2025
A novel by Mexican Juan Pablo Villalobos, poetry by Mexican Ingrid Bringas, and a biography by Argentinian Mercedes Halfon
PAUL DONOVAN applauds an entertaining dramatisation of the famous dispute that gives insight into the struggle, and Murdoch’s unscrupulous mendacity
ELLIS RAE is disappointed by the revival of a nihilistic play that fails to offer alternatives for social change
STEVE JOHNSON recommends an exceptional album that explores the narrative folk tradition often with a strong political message
JOHN GREEN appreciates an informative and readable account of the nation state and its current dilemmas, but doubts the solutions this author has to offer
Multitudes: How Crowds Made the Modern World
Dan Hancox
Verso, £20
“WHY do we join crowds?,” asks Dan Hancox in his book examining the crowd in its physical, social and psychological forms. Mob, horde, rabble, mass, swarm — there is no shortage of denigratory terms to describe large gatherings of humanity, whether their communal purpose is to support their local football team or to celebrate in shared carnivalesque joy at the burgeoning music festivals but particularly to demonstrate for or against an infringement on their own or others’ freedoms.
Hancox claims that the crowd is “both the agent and the protagonist of history; the harbinger of change, the forcer of arguments.”
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