Peacebuilding a shared Northern Irish society
EcoTrail Wicklow 46k reviewby Allan LEONARD26 September 2026 The forecast for good weather proved true, as I lightly jogged the kilometre down the road to the beachside esplanade of Bray town. This was confirmed by a live broadcast link with race crew at Bray Head, announcing the perfect conditions. The race director, Seán Clifford, declared... Continue Reading →
Book review — How I Make Photographs ( Joel Meyerowitz) by Allan LEONARD 18 October 2020 Joel Meyerowitz is a renowned street photographer, long before the term became a familiar recognised genre (or subgenre of documentary photography). Once working as an art director, after an encounter with photographer Robert Frank, he quit his job and... Continue Reading →
Great Thinkers is a compilation of 60 short essays -- about 1,500 to 3,000 words each -- published by The School of Life, which dedicates itself to “developing emotional intelligence through the help of culture”. It describes the book as a volume of some of the most important ideas of Eastern and Western culture, drawn... Continue Reading →
Book review: Anna Lo: The Place I Call Home by Allan LEONARD 15 August 2019 Anna Lo writes with a crisp and concise manner, demonstrating her fine skills in English that she makes reference to in her memoir. The Place I Call Home is a chronological story, from her childhood to current retirement. It gives... Continue Reading →
Book review — The Colour of Time (Dan Jones & Marina Amaral) by Allan LEONARD 26 May 2019 Released in hardcover in August 2018 and now available in paperback, The Colour of Time, by historian Dan Jones and artist Marina Amaral, is a collection of 200 colourised photographs taken between 1850 and 1960. With accompanying... Continue Reading →
Book review — Don’t Mention the War (Vicky Cosstick) by Allan LEONARD 5 March 2019 Don’t Mention the War is an e-book by Vicky Cosstick, published by ChangeAware in association with Northern Slant, that aims to explore aspects of legacy of the Troubles in Northern Ireland in a set of five chapters covering the peace process,... Continue Reading →
Book review — Bobby Sands (Yan Morvan) by Allan LEONARD 11 October 2018 Sorj Chalandon ends his foreword with a question from Bobby Sands’ memorial card: “Will tomorrow be remembered?” He is with Bobby Sands, a photobook by Yan Morvan. https://youtu.be/20VVWz6XtVo It is said that a journalist creates the first draft of history, and Morvan’s... Continue Reading →
Book review — A Job to Love (The School of Life) by Allan LEONARD 28 April 2018 I acquired A Job to Love by The School of Life (founder and chairman, Alain DE BOTTON) when I had pretty much decided to enter the job market of the freelancer. So perhaps this read was for self-affirmation.... Continue Reading →
Review: The Enlightenment: A Very Short Introduction (John ROBERTSON) by Allan LEONARD for Mr Ulster 1 May 2017 The Enlightenment is one of Oxford University Press’s “Very Short Introductions” series; there are over 400 volumes. Written by experts, they “are for anyone wanting a stimulating and accessible way into a new subject”. Professor John Robertson’s... Continue Reading →
I have read most of de Botton's books, and The Pleasures and Sorrows of Work took me the longest to finish, partly because I am a slow reader, but I blame more on the editing. The chapters are his brief immersions in ten jobs, across the professions. While absorbing his philosophical reflections was at times illuminating,... Continue Reading →
Failed It! by Erik Kessels is an easy read of his encouragement of embracing failure as a means of revealing a better discovery. He intersperses his quips with visual inspirations, from both the intentional (by seasoned artists) and the unintentional (by reconsidering the work of some amateurs). The strength of this short book is demonstrating... Continue Reading →
René Magritte was the first artist that I identified with -- particularly his sense of humour yet thought provoking presentations of surrealism. One of my favourites paintings of his -- and one of his more famous ones -- is Ceci n'est pas une pipe, because literally it is not a pipe; it is an image... Continue Reading →