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Look Ma - No Hands!

Review from Virtual Ireland

Backup information on Robert Brennan, copied without permission for archival purposes only, from
Virtual Ireland.


IRELAND STANDING FIRM & EAMON DE VALERA, A Memoir by Robert Brennan (1881-1964)

Two memoirs written in the late 1950s by Robert Brennan, a republican activist in the early years of the twentieth century, journalist and close associate of Eamon de Valera.Ireland Standing Firm is a frank and pungent account of Robert Brennan’s time as Irish Minister (in effect Irish Ambassador) in Washington immediately before and during the Second World War. Brennan gives a fascinating account of his efforts in defending Irish neutrality and his meetings with leading American officials and politicians, including Franklin D. Roosevelt.

In the second memoir, Eamon de Valera, Brennan describes his close association with Eamon de Valera from their first meeting in prison in 1917 until de Valera’s retirement as Taoiseach in 1959.

Brennan is an entertaining writer and these memoirs were originally written for publication in the Irish Press newspaper in the 1950s.

THE AUTHOR Robert Brennan (1881-1964) was born in Wexford and worked as a surveyor, journalist and writer before joining Sinn Féin. He was the first Managing Editor of the Irish Press newspaper and was appointed by de Valera as Secretary of the Irish Legation and later Minister in Washington (1934-47). After his return from Washington he was Director of Radio Éireann.

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