Los Angeles Times
Irish on the Inside is packed and demanding. You'll be charmed, perhaps, by Part I but, again perhaps, puzzled, mystified and at-swim in Part II. Read Part II slowly and, whether you agree or disagree with Hayden's uncompromising views—pro-Sinn Fein, anti-colonialist—you'll find it a valuable guide to the craziness of a troubled area.
Publishers Weekly
Hayden, a leading student activist in the 1960s and now a California state senator, writes about finding his Irish roots in a book that will have many Irish-Americans up in arms with its take-no-prisoners, leftist spin on Irish history. But he makes some very good cultural points. He speaks, for instance, of the "colonization of the mind" and how this affected the Irish under British rule and as immigrants in America, which largely started with the potato famine of the 1840s. Hayden's humor is mordant and dry as he takes on such "experts" on the Irish as former senator Daniel Patrick Moynihan (who thought the Irish lacked intellectual curiosity), and former governor Pete Wilson of California, who boasted of his Irishness while running anti-immigrant ads. He speaks of growing up in an Irish-Catholic family which could have come out of a Eugene O'Neill drama; his admiration for John and Robert Kennedy, particularly the thoughtful, saturnine Bobby who emerged after the death of JFK. Hayden then goes on to report on everything Irish in America, from the Molly Maguires and the "forgotten" San Patricios, to the politics of the wild Fenian revolutionary, Jeremiah O'Donovan Rossa. He then gives his spin on the struggle in Northern Ireland and how it was sabotaged for years by such Irish-Catholic luminaries as Tip O'Neill, Ted Kennedy and former House Speaker Tom Foley. Some of his points will outrage the Irish establishment in this country, but Hayden makes a strong case for his leftist interpretation of Irish and Irish-America history.. (Oct. 25) Copyright 2001 Cahners Business Information.
Library Journal
During the 1960s, Hayden was in the forefront of social justice activism, but the conflict in his ancestral homeland was not part of his agenda. Hayden's family had long ago suppressed its Irish identity to merge into Anglo-American society. That changed in 1968 when civil rights marches in Northern Ireland awakened in the young radical an awareness of his ethnic identity, and later friendships with Northern Irish activists Gerry Adams and Martin McGuinness revealed the connection of Old World struggles with those in the New. This work is both a memoir and an examination of Irish and Irish American history. Unfortunately, much of Hayden's analysis is overly simplistic, accepting as self-evident claims the text does not otherwise support. For example, several times he asserts without qualification that the Irish Famine was "the greatest upheaval of nineteenth century Europe" conveniently ignoring such disasters as the Napoleonic Wars or the Revolution of 1848. As a personal memoir, however, this is a revealing look at Hayden's youth and his journey of self-discovery. Recommended for larger public libraries. Christopher Brennan, SUNY at Brockport Copyright 2001 Cahners Business Information.
Kirkus Reviews
A pugnacious autobiographical treatise, in which former California state senator Hayden reclaims his Irish identity. Hayden's family emigrated to the US during the years of the Famine and quickly assumed the assimilationist role, both out of a desire to survive (the "wild Irish" were perhaps as despised as Natives and African-Americans, though they had an ace up their sleeve: the right to vote) and out of the shame that accompanied the Great Hunger and the subsequent flight into amnesia. Here, Hayden tells his story of regaining his Irishness, and why. In the Irish soul he finds appealing elements: rebelliousness, moral idealism, communal ethics, mysticism, all still in circulation despite the best efforts of the church and an occupation state. He finds in the language and music a cultural diversity akin to biodiversity, not only an intrinsic value but a strengthening and protective character for society writ large, for it is at once very much itself and inclusive. Equally attractive are historical ties of the Irish to radical movements and their experience with servitude: As both victims and victimizers-Hayden draws upon the treatment of African-Americans by the American Irish during the latter half of the 19th century-he also considers the Irish experience invaluable in examining how racial attitudes are formed, and how it can be subverted to form links with the nonwhite world through a common history of colonialism, starvation, poverty, and threats of genocide. The heart here, though, is in Hayden's time spent in Ireland, particularly Northern Ireland, and his efforts to understand-more so, to live-the unfolding of Irish history as it is played out along political,economic, and human fronts. An electric piece of emotional archaeology and a welcoming back of an ethnic spirit-nonconformist, open, ancient-that anyone could be proud to claim.
