Lismore

Reviews:

‘… James Ballantyne has the gifts of a natural writer, resulting here in a substantial work that
is skilfully realised, deeply humane and never patronising. Lismore is a personal and communal chronicle of a somewhat atypical Irish town, here recalled with remarkable detail, authenticity and insight as it was during the author’s growing up and before the imminent cultural watershed of television would truly make the Irish small-town past another country..’
Michael Coady

‘… may well be the most comprehensive, authentic and indeed fond account of any town written about in Ireland in the period covered…’
Eugene F. Dennis –  The Lismoreian II, 2007

‘… an entertaining read and valuable sociological work…’
Donald Brady –  The Writers of County Waterford (2006) on the 1995 edition

Comments excerpted from a letter to James Ballantyne on 27 October 2008 from the late Professor Paul Smith, then Professor of History at the University of Southampton.

‘…Jim, a rather overdue note to thank you for the pleasure I gained from reading Lismore: Autobiography of an Irish Town 1937-1954, the most astonishingly complete portrait of boyhood in a single place that I have ever come across. I’m quite staggered by the extent and precision of your recollection: I couldn’t conceivably produce a parallel account of my own youth, but nonetheless, with what memory I can summon, it’s been interesting to compare your experience with my own, growing up in exactly the same period and, for the latter part of it, in a small Hampshire town – many differences, of course, but much in common.’

My impression is that very little is left of the Ireland it captures so well and anyone who wants to understand something of that era will need to consult ‘Ballantyne’ – I can see it in the reading lists and the footnotes already! It’s more than an account, it’s a re-creation: a most impressive production.
Professor Paul Smith

“A striking smalltown tale. Like a long conversation with a favourite uncle, James Ballantyne’s Lismore: Autobiography of an Irish Town 1937-1954 is both enjoyable and informative.
Anyone who grew up in small-town Ireland in the middle years of the last century will find themselves completely at home and anyone who wants to know what life was like then will find an honest and detailed account… The book makes for easy reading for the general reader, yet anyone looking for a “what happened when” history of the town in the years 1937-54 will find that too. It is both a prodigious feat of research (undertaken over 20 years), and obviously a labour of love… It is striking to realise that only 60 years ago Ireland was a relatively deprived society where it was commonplace for children to go without shoes or underwear… If it was deprived, it was also a lot more innocent than it is today… Local libraries, cinemas and dancehalls, sports grounds and beauty spots were the focus of the precious leisure hours of the townspeople. Despite the complexities of life after the Civil War, even politics was a simpler affair…
The chapter in which, at the age of 17, the writer leaves Lismore for the life that will eventually see him settled in England, with a career as a librarian, is moving, and mirrored in the experiences of all those forced to emigrate by economic necessity. Ballantyne’s book is evocative and inspiring and a welcome addition to the social history memoir genre.”
The Irish Times

“In Lismore, Co Waterford in those years, crime was as rare as a hot-water tap. In other words, there was no luxury and nothing to steal. That said, not even the poverty of the period detracts from the joy and exuberance of the book. Reading this bucolic elegy is like pulling up linoleum and reading a 60-year-old newspaper. We read, for example, about holidays: a leisurely trip to Carrick-on-Suir took a whole day… Scholarly, satisfying and – at 582 pages – years in the making.”
Sunday Tribune

“… This affectionate memoir is of a time and place crystallised by belonging to half a century ago, and it has taken twenty years to assemble… [Ballantyne] has written a lot of poetry and there is a poetic, elegiac quality to his account of growing up in Lismore which tells of events and features of the town as well as of his youth… The book is self-published, but better in design and production than many professional products.”
Books Ireland, September 2008

“This beautifully written book examines the life of the small Co. Waterford town of Lismore during the writer’s childhood and formative years in the mid-20th century. Using his own family as a study example and over twenty years of work James Ballantyne has produced a fascinating social history of a rural way of life that is almost forgotten.”
The Irish Post

“Vivid, humorous look at Irish smalltown life in the 40s and 50s. This book combines a portrait of a small Irish town with its author’s reminiscences of growing up there in the 1940s and 50s. [James] Ballantyne is a former librarian and CILIP member who has adroitly depicted life in a world that no longer exists. The book merits our attention because of its affectionate portrayal of the library in Lismore, which [played] such an important part in young James’s life… James made extensive use of the library, waiting anxiously for the half-year delivery of new books. All this is described in an engaging manner with some gentle irony on the qualities of the censorious attitudes of the book committee. He also provides some honest information on his reading habits, including the relish with which comics such as the Rover, Hotspur and Wizard were consumed. Of course, there is much more to this book than the library. Chapters cover Gaelic sports, religion, education, health, family life, sin and sexuality, among many other subjects. He provides us with a microcosm of Irish smalltown life with deprivation all around, and its trials and tribulations are depicted in a refreshingly honest, humorous and realistic way. This is a delightful encapsulation of a place. There is vivid and detailed description… This final printed version has been 20 years in the making and is all the better for this.”
Library & Information Update (CILIP)

“James Ballantyne’s book does remarkable justice to the town’s day-by-day life in all its microscopic detail, as it was during a 17-year period in the mid twentieth century. The swirling changes in the social landscape, imperceptible at the time, but whose patterns only became clear later on, are fantastically documented. The book is so packed with detail and so redolent with atmosphere that it reads more like a novel than a documentary; no wonder that such esteemed writers as Michael Coady have been so approving. This title is also an apt demonstration of how standards in self-publishing can easily match those of professional publishing houses.”
Hugh Oram (Books Ireland, Summer 2009)