Fintan O'Toole
@fotoole.bsky.social
Writer, Irish Times columnist, New York Review of Books contributor, We Don't Know Ourselves author.
In case you missed it. The charming, brilliant, funny, adorable, erudite @fotoole.bsky.social (with my wee cartoon! Squeeee!) during the fantastic Joseph Hassett lecture at the @nlireland.bsky.social youtu.be/G6HefKdky7s?...
Joseph Hassett Lecture 2026 | WB Yeats: National Pride and National Vanity - Fintan O'Toole
YouTube video by National Library Ireland
youtu.be
Read this absolutely fantastic @FT deep dive on Palantir and its CEO Alex Karp, by my colleagues @chriscook.news @georgehammond.bsky.social and Alex Rogers as.ft.com/r/1b34df7a-4...
The price of Palantir’s politics
Pushback to the tech group’s politics may threaten the core of its $330bn business
as.ft.com
"It is this flood of provocation, atrocity, self-dealing and fabrication that makes #Haberman and #Swan ’s counternarrative so vital." - @fotoole.bsky.social @nytbookreview.bsky.social #RegimeChange #maggiehaberman #jonathanswan @simonandschuster.bsky.social www.nytimes.com/2026/06/18/b...
‘We Need Plot Twists’: Behind the Scenes of Trump’s Second Term
nytimes.com
On our trip around rural Ireland, much of my reading has been this. @fotoole.bsky.social is the very best of guides; his writing is always incisive but in this book it's frequently revelatory too. Fantastic.
Exactly 10 years since the Brexit vote, the verdict is in.
Steve Hilton’s “British career had been largely about wrapping hard-right ideas in touchy-feely niceness,” writes @fotoole.bsky.social. “Silicon Valley…would want to do the same thing in reverse, ditching its ‘Don’t be evil’ credo for the joy of being evil.”
Cloudbusting in California | Fintan O’Toole
Just over twenty years ago, in April 2006, British media gave generous space to film and photographs of a sled hauled over a vast expanse of snow by a
nybooks.com
I'll be giving the Yeats birthday lecture at the National Library in Dublin on Wednesday. All welcome. www.nli.ie/exhibitions-...
WB Yeats: National Pride and National Vanity | Joseph Hassett Lecture 2026
Delivered by writer Fintan O’Toole
nli.ie
The great @fotoole.bsky.social poses a question that has haunted every truth-seeking journalist during the Trump years: "What can journalists do in a world where there is no shame and, apparently, no consequence?" www.nytimes.com/2026/06/18/b...
‘We Need Plot Twists’: Behind the Scenes of Trump’s Second Term
nytimes.com
One of the best written and informative books I have ever read is Fintan O'Toole's, 'We don't know ourselves - a personal history of Ireland since 1958' The section on the Hunger strikes is harrowing, gripping and very enlightening Treat yourself to a copy @fotoole.bsky.social
www.theguardian.com/commentisfre...
The aftershocks of Brexit’s failure could be gaining strength – a fearful prospect for Ireland | Fintan O’Toole
On our side of the Irish Sea we have made the best of a bad job. But we saw the damage a reckless British government could do, says Fintan O’Toole
theguardian.com
‘A delightful praise-song for both the Bard and the geniuses who labour to give his “local habitation and a name” a new postal address and a novel appellation.’— @fotoole.bsky.social #translation
Shakespeare without borders | The Observer
Daniel Hahn’s If This Be Magic reveals the ingenious art of the great playwright’s translators
observer.co.uk
😊🙏🏻 @annettedittert.bsky.social & @fotoole.bsky.social
Annette Dittert@annettedittert.bsky.social · 2mo agoDie deu Berichterstattung über Belfast war größtenteils von Unwissen über die dortige Situation geprägt - oder von bewusst darüber gelegten Narrativen im Gefolge von Musk. Im Tsp analysiert @fotoole die eigentlichen Hintergründe. Hervorragendes Interview mit der klugen @tessaszy.bsky.social 👇
One detail in this fascinating BBC investigation into the Russia-instigated attack on Keir Starmer's home is the way it shows, in passing but very clearly, that Tommy Robinson is to all intents and purposes a Russian asset. www.bbc.co.uk/news/article...
Russia was behind arson attacks targeting PM, BBC reveals
Evidence shows Russians directing the plot and stoking tensions with fake far-right and Muslim groups.
bbc.co.uk
Happy birthday to Anoushka Shankar! “…George Harrison, whom Anoushka refers to as ‘Uncle George.’ ‘He says he’s the president of my fan club,’ Anoushka giggles.” - Associated Press (1998) More at harrisonarchive.tumblr.com/post/8189602....
“Trump’s constant reference to the idea that the world has nothing better to do but sit around and laugh at America is not incompatible with American exceptionalism—it is a kind of backhanded compliment to it.” —@fotoole.bsky.social
Gulliver’s Warning | Fintan O’Toole
Like Gulliver in Lilliput, “greatness” in the political realm depends on the existence of a group deemed puny or weak.
nybooks.com
“The great appear great because we are on our knees. Let us rise”: a timely essay by his Irishness @fotoole.bsky.social on the project of imperialism and national vanity as lampooned in “Gulliver’s Travels.” www.nybooks.com/articles/202...
Gulliver’s Warning | Fintan O’Toole
Like Gulliver in Lilliput, “greatness” in the political realm depends on the existence of a group deemed puny or weak.
nybooks.com
“When greatness is evoked as the natural condition of the nation, equality is humiliation. Because greatness can be measured only by comparison, it cannot exist on the level.” —@fotoole.bsky.social
Gulliver’s Warning | Fintan O’Toole
Like Gulliver in Lilliput, “greatness” in the political realm depends on the existence of a group deemed puny or weak.
nybooks.com
Reading @fotoole.bsky.social on “contemporary sublime politics.” He articulates much of what I was thinking when making the cutout, “Lilliputian Men and Root Bound Plants” in 2024
Fintan O'Toole@fotoole.bsky.social · 2mo agoOur 6/25 issue is now online, with @dchiasso.bsky.social on writing away from AI, Meghan O’Gieblyn on raising AI, Geoffrey Wheatcroft on Labour’s losses, @mmschwartz.bsky.social on the purloined papyrus, @fotoole.bsky.social on the president’s “greatness,” and much more.
June 25, 2026 Issue
Table of Contents
nybooks.com
www.themorgan.org/programs/per...
2026 | Ulysses in Performance: An Evening with Elevator Repair Service and Fintan O'Toole | Performance | The Morgan Library & Museum
James Joyce’s Ulysses has fascinated, perplexed, scandalized, and defeated readers for over a century. Now, Elevator Repair Service (ERS), known for its inventive stagings of modernist classics like G...
themorgan.org
ICYMI: “For and Against a United Ireland,” a book commissioned by @arinsproject.bsky.social, received the Ewart-Biggs Prize earlier this spring. Authors @fotoole.bsky.social and @sjamcbride.bsky.social also spoke to packed crowds on a U.S. tour. 👉 Read more: irishstudies.nd.edu/news/for-and...
Sam McBride and I will be at Hinterland in Kells on June 28th. www.hinterland.ie/p-669-fintan...
Fintan O’Toole & Sam McBride - Hinterland Festival of Literature & Arts
Fintan O’Toole & Sam McBride
hinterland.ie
