Dublin 1916

The Siege of the GPO

Clair Wills

ISBN 1846680611

ISBN 13 9781846680618

March 2010

Price £8.99

Paperback, 224 pp.

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Subject: History

Other formats available: Hardback

Headquarters and focus of the 1916 Rising, Dublin’s General Post Office is the most famous building in Ireland. This book tells the story of the events in and around the GPO in Easter Week, using eye-witness accounts, diaries and newspaper reports – 'a riveting read' Roy Foster

It was taken over by the Irish Volunteers on Easter Monday 1916 and held for nearly a week. But the rebels finally surrendered the GPO to the Crown forces after heavy gun bombardment, and the ensuing conflagration reduced the building to an empty shell and destroyed much of the centre of the city.

Clair Wills’ rich and rewarding book recounts the dramatic events of Easter Week. But she also tracks the obsession with Dublin's iconic edifice through literature, film and art, exploring the twists and turns that the myth of the GPO has undergone in the last century. It has stood for sacrifice and treachery, national unity and divisive violence, for the future and the past.

‘Anybody familiar with the events and personalities will enjoy the anecdotes and Wills’s reflections, which are delivered with verve... Wills is at her best when discussing the poetry and dramatic works that were prompted by 1916...’
— Mary E Daly, Irish Times