Arthur Aughey

Lincolnshire, September 2022. Edward Sweeney has come to celebrate the seventieth birthday of two old friends from his student days. The countryside he finds charming, the late summer weather delightful and the company welcoming. Yet he arrives as a superfluous man, deeply infected by the farcicality of the age and the pessimism of the times. A superannuated university professor, he suspects the bookish wisdom which served him so well in the past and has lost those certainties which gave his life comfort as well as meaning. His paradoxical character, companionable but elusive, settled but uncommitted, rational but superstitious, has become disordered and he finds it difficult to resist the instinct to retreat from life. Between Hougham and Heaven follows Sweeney's struggle to recover self-belief as he experiences a different world of village, pub, church and family in rural Lincolnshire. It explores the permanent questions of youth and age, tradition and modernity, faith and unbelief, commitment and indifference. This is one in a series of novels featuring Edward Sweeney. The chronological order of the trilogy is: The Last Train to HullFour Days in VillachBetween Hougham and Heaven

The Last Train to Hull is the story of bookish but naive Edward Sweeney. Arriving at Hull University from Belfast in 1976 to study for his doctorate, Sweeney finds himself between worlds - Northern Ireland and England, working-class family and middle-class friends, youth and maturity, fantasy and reality. Yet he doesn't feel he's exchanged one godforsaken place for another. Hull, despite an atmosphere of isolation and economic decline, gives him permission to live freely. A scholarly career beckons, and life has never seemed better. He falls in love with a local woman who, like him, lives between worlds and he jokes he had to travel all this way just to find her. It is a relationship which challenges Sweeney's comforting illusions and confronts him with the question whether, in life and in love, we should choose to be more, rather than less, deceived.

Four Days in Villach tells a story of return, reminiscence and rediscovery. Former lovers Edward Sweeney and Sonja Maier meet again after a gap of twenty-five years. Partly dissonant, partly harmonious, theirs was a romance which ranged across nations and between cultures. Now, as they struggle to re-map the boundaries of that relationship, they take a sentimental journey through the landscape of their past on the borderlands of Austria, Italy and Slovenia. Both are surprised to find neither age nor separation has diminished mutual pleasures of companionship. In these four days they experience late joys as fulfilling as the expectations of youth.

This book re-examines the claim of the Conservative Party to be the ‘national party’ and in its politics to express the enduring ‘national interest’. It explores the historical character of the Conservative Party, in particular the significance of the nation in its self-understanding. It addresses the political culture of the modern party, one which proclaims a Unionist vocation but rests mainly on English support, and considers how the Englishness of the party is reconciled with the politics of British statecraft. It considers the constitutional challenges which the Conservative Party faces in managing a changing Union, in negotiating a changing Europe and in defining a changing national interest. The book is essential reading not only for students and scholars of the Conservative Party but also for those who want to make sense of the transformations taking place in modern British politics.

Hopes for a peaceful settlement in Northern Ireland have again put the politics of the province under the spotlight. This new text, written by acknowledged experts on Northern Ireland, provides an immediately accessible introduction to the multi-faceted nature of the politics of the region.

There is a sustained interest amongst students of British politics, as well as an informed public, about the future state of the United Kingdom. The issue at stake is whether the UK’s multinational institutions can endure the challenge of political nationalism, especially in Scotland. This has become known as the British Question. This book is designed as both a framework text – setting out concepts by which to understand the British Question – and a synthetic text – providing a digest of significant academic work on historical, conceptual and political matters relevant to that question. The value of the book is its unique focus on the character, resources and function of the United Kingdom as a whole.

There is a sustained interest amongst students of British politics, as well as an informed public, about the future state of the United Kingdom. The issue at stake is whether the UK’s multinational institutions can endure the challenge of political nationalism, especially in Scotland. This has become known as the British Question. This book is designed as both a framework text – setting out concepts by which to understand the British Question – and a synthetic text – providing a digest of significant academic work on historical, conceptual and political matters relevant to that question. The value of the book is its unique focus on the character, resources and function of the United Kingdom as a whole. It will be essential reading for students and teachers of British politics looking for a coherent interpretation of what is at stake when the future of the United Kingdom is being debated.

Irish Civilization provides the perfect background and introduction to both the history of Ireland until 1921 and the development of Ireland and Northern Ireland since 1921. This book illustrates how these societies have developed in common but also those elements where there have been, and continue to be, substantial differences. It includes a focus on certain central structural aspects, such as: the physical geography, the people, political and governmental structures, cultural contexts, economic and social institutions, and education and the media. Irish Civilization is a vital introduction to the complex history of Ireland and concludes with a discussion of the present state of the relationship between them. It is an essential resource for students of Irish Studies and general readers alike.

Irish Civilization provides the perfect background and introduction to both the history of Ireland until 1921 and the development of Ireland and Northern Ireland since 1921. This book illustrates how these societies have developed in common but also those elements where there have been, and continue to be, substantial differences. It includes a focus on certain central structural aspects, such as: the physical geography, the people, political and governmental structures, cultural contexts, economic and social institutions, and education and the media. Irish Civilization is a vital introduction to the complex history of Ireland and concludes with a discussion of the present state of the relationship between them. It is an essential resource for students of Irish Studies and general readers alike.

The politics of Englishness provides a digest of the debates about England and Englishness and a unique perspective on those debates. Not only does the book provide readers with ready access to and interpretation of the significant literature on the English Question, it also enables them to make sense of the political, historical and cultural factors which constitute that question. The book addresses the condition of England in three interrelated parts. The first looks at traditional narratives of the English polity and reads them as variations of a legend of political Englishness, of England as the exemplary exception, exceptional in its constitutional tradition and exemplary in its political stability. The second considers how the decay of that legend has encouraged anxieties about English political identity and about how English identity can be recognised within the new complexity of British governance. The third revisits these narratives and anxieties, examining them in terms of actual and metaphorical ‘locations’ of Englishness: the regional, the European and the British.

In this book, one of the leading authorities on contemporary Northern Ireland politics provides an original, sophisticated and innovative examination of the post-Belfast agreement political landscape. Written in a fluid, witty and accessible style, this book explores:how the Belfast Agreement has changed the politics of Northern Irelandwhether the peace process is still validthe problems caused by the language of politics in Northern Irelandthe conditions necessary to secure political stability the inability of unionists and republicans to share the same political discoursethe insights that political theory can offer to Northern Irish politicsthe future of key political parties and institutions.

In this book, one of the leading authorities on contemporary Northern Ireland politics provides an original, sophisticated and innovative examination of the post-Belfast agreement political landscape. Written in a fluid, witty and accessible style, this book explores:how the Belfast Agreement has changed the politics of Northern Irelandwhether the peace process is still validthe problems caused by the language of politics in Northern Irelandthe conditions necessary to secure political stability the inability of unionists and republicans to share the same political discoursethe insights that political theory can offer to Northern Irish politicsthe future of key political parties and institutions.

With the advent of devolution, it is clear that the British Constitution is currently undergoing a period of dynamic transformation. England, Ireland, Scotland, and Wales were slowly united by conquest and treaty over the last 300 years, a unity which was only broken by the 1922 agreement that split Ireland in two. The last 50 years have seen the collapse of empire, and while the pull of local nationalism within the United Kingdom continues to strengthen, integrative narratives of Britishness weaken. In this insightful book, Arthur Aughey outlines the changing character of the United Kingdom polity, and examines the developing debate about the meaning of the Union in the context of New Labour/New Britain. In a systematic survey of historical, theoretical and political reflection on the nature of Britishness, he questions what the Union once was, what it means now and what it might become, taking into account the challenge posed by internal divisions along with the problems posed by European integration and globalisation.