An introduction to Irish History: assess the historical importance of the Easter Rising

Résumé du document

The beginning of World War I, had given the old republican motto "England's difficulty is Ireland's opportunity?, fresh life. From August 1914, the rejuvenated Irish Republican Brotherhood, had decided to launch an attack before the end of the war hostilities, resulting in the "Easter Rising? in 1916.The roots of the Rising lie in the ?new nationalism' which emerged in Ireland from the 1890's. Indeed, after Parnell's death, the forces which his leadership had held together in a great unified national movement split apart and the result was a decade of political division and ineffectiveness.

Extraits

[...] The mobilization was not significant and the rising lasted less than a week. It was greeted with little public support by Dubliners and by the Irish population as a whole. Lenin had analysed the Easter events as a premature revolution, a popular rising against British imperialism, however it was nothing more but a mere attempt of an intellectual backgrounded nationalist minority. Since three out of the seven members of the IRB military council were poets (Pearse, Mcdonagh, and Plunkett), and because of three famous Yeast's poems describing the rising (Easter 1916, Sixteen dead men and the Rose), the Easter rising was often dubbed The Poet's revolution ».[4]This emphasizes the idealism of the event and implies a blue sky rising which had no chance to achieve success. [...]

[...] An introduction to Irish History: assess the historical importance of the Easter Rising The general post office after the Easter Rising Assess the historical importance of the Easter Rising The beginning of World War had given the old republican motto' England's difficulty is Ireland's opportunity' fresh life. From August 1914, the rejuvenated Irish Republican Brotherhood, had decided to launch an attack before the end of the war hostilities, the Easter Rising in 1916.The roots of the Rising lie in the nationalism' which emerged in Ireland from the 1890s. [...]

[...] The Anglo Irish war from 1919 to 1921, that led to the proclamation of an independent Irish republic, was a proof that parliamentarism was definitely rejected in favour of nationalism and its violent methods. If one analyzes the «Easter rising» in military terms, it was a failure. However, in order to grasp the real historical importance of the event one ought to take into account the real aims and intentions of those who led it. More than a rising, the Easter event was seen by its instigators as a blood sacrifice meant to revive Ireland's sense of itself as a distinct nation. [...]

[...] However Irish people were still loyal to parliamentarism and the Irish parliamentary party. They had set all their hopes on John Redmond whose home rule bill had received the royal assent on September 1914 and had become law. From then on, the British government made a succession of mistakes that led to stimulate a growing doubt about the sincerity and good intentions of the British government and lastly led to the discrediting of Redmond and his party. Among other things, the British government granted Ulster and unionists, preferential treatments which conveyed the impression that there was one law for Ulster and another for the rest of Ireland and exacerbated nationalist's resentment towards Great Britain. [...]

[...] That's why, at first sight, one may consider the rising as a flash in a pan, without historical importance. However a military failure, it was a real popular success, and its aftermaths, namely a renewed interest in independence through a change in the attitude of the Irish people, paved the way for the forthcoming independence. Keeping in mind that in the first decade of the 20th century, the great majority of people were hostile to the violence of nationalist methods and loyal to John Redmond and parliamentarism, this blood sacrifice was a real tour de force, a final shock to complete the disillusionment of Irish people to rally them to nationalist methods, to rejuvenate Irish nationalism. [...]