The Politics of Pain, Fintan OToole
The Politics of Pain, Fintan OToole
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The Politics of Pain
Postwar England and the Rise of Nationalism

Author: Fintan O'Toole

Narrator: Bruce Mann

Unabridged: 8 hr 5 min

Format: Digital Audiobook Download

Published: 11/05/2019


Synopsis

From one of the most perceptive observers of the English today comes a brilliantly insightful, mordantly funny account of their seemingly irrational embrace of nationalism.

England's recent lurch to the right appears to be but one example of the nationalist wave sweeping across the world, yet as acclaimed Irish critic Fintan O'Toole suggests in The Politics of Pain, it is, in reality, a phenomenon rooted in World War II. We must look not to the vagaries of the European Union but, instead, far back to the end of the British empire, if we hope to understand our most fraternal ally—and the royal mess in which the British now find themselves. O'Toole depicts a roiling nation that almost ludicrously dreams of a German invasion, if only to get the blood going, and that erupts in faux outrage over regulations on "prawn-flavored crisps." A sympathetic yet unsparing observer, O'Toole asks: How did a great nation bring itself to the point of such willful self-harm? His answer represents one of the most profound portraits of the English since Sarah Lyall's New York Times bestseller The Anglo Files.

About Fintan O'Toole

Fintan O'Toole is a columnist for the Irish Times and a professor at Princeton University. A regular contributor to the New York Review of Books and the Guardian and the author of several books, he lives in Princeton, New Jersey, and Dublin, Ireland.


Reviews

Goodreads review by Rory

If you are, say, a liberal-leaning American, and you want to know what the heck is the matter with England, then this is the book to which you should turn. The writer is, happily and necessarily, Irish. Here you will find the disease known as ‘Brexit’ fully described and diagnosed. The prospect of a c......more

Goodreads review by Tom

Having lived with Brexit for three years, I never really understood it until now. There seemed to be literally no benefit to leaving the EU. All the supposed advantages: taking back control of our borders; repatriating powers from the ECJ; £350 million per week for the NHS; signing free trade deals......more