Me Jewel and Darlin' Dublin

50th Anniversary Edition    

 A beautifully presented and attractively laid out commemorative edition, with new introductions by Ivan O'Brien, MD of The O'Brien Press and best-selling author Dónal Fallon. 

 The very first book published by The O'Brien Press in 1974 celebrates fifty years in print. 

 The O'Brien Press launched its first publication in November 1974.   Me Jewel and Darlin' Dublin  , written by Éamonn MacThomáis and published while the author was in jail, was an immediate success and has become a classic. Full of historical facts, anecdotes and Dublin wit, this book evokes the spirit, the characters and colours, the sights, sounds and even the smells of old Dublin. With sections on markets, pawn shops, street characters, the Liberties, slang and wit of Dublin's newspapers, the city's history is traced right back to Brian Boru, the Huguenots, 'the debtors' prison', and Dublin's troubled history of risings and revolutions . 

 Celebrating fifty years of Me Jewel & Darlin' Dublin – and of The O'Brien Press.

PUBLISHER'S FOREWORD – IVAN O'BRIEN 7

FOREWORD – DONAL FALLON 11

1 A Child's World

THE FOURPENNY RUSH 15

A DUBLIN PENNY 19

STREET GAMES 21

2 The Old Ways

THE PAWNSHOPS OF DUBLIN 27

THE COMEDY KING 34

STREET CHARACTERS 40

SOME DUBLIN SLANG 51

SOUNDS, SMELLS AND COLOURS 55

DUBLIN'S OLD NEWSPAPERS 60

3 Old Dublin Town

DUBLIN'S MANY LIBERTIES 69

AROUND ST WERBURGH'S 85

FORD OF HURDLES 89

4 Commercial Life

BACK OF THE PIPES 109

MERCHANTS AND MARKETS 112

A TRIP DOWN THE PORT 121

5 Hidden Places

AROUND ST MARY'S ABBEY 127

THE FIVE LAMPS 134

THE ROYAL CIRCUS 140

PHOENIX PARK 144

THE KING'S COWBOY 147

OLD KILMAINHAM 148

6 The City Centre

ST STEPHEN'S GREEN 155

TRINITY COLLEGE 170

AROUND COLLEGE GREEN 176

DUBLIN'S REVOLUTIONARY SQUARE 181

A NOTE ON PUBLICATION 188

INDEX 191

Many books have been written about various aspects of Dublin, but none has captured the atmosphere of the living city so well as Me Jewel and Darlin' Dublin



MacThomáis makes the city sing with his uncanny ear for the voices and sounds that give it its uniqueness. A book to treasure.



those yet to engage with the book are in for a treat, as it is a truly unique piece of writing, in the mould of James Joyce and Flann O'Brien



Éamonn Mac Thomáis takes us on a colourful romp across the city - north, south, east and west and across the river Liffey - telling us many intimate stories about the history, the characters and the places they inhabited. The written material is greatly enhanced by the great variety of illustrations in the book, particularly the line drawings by Michael O'Brien … full of human interest, anecdotes and colour which more than justifies the publication of its 50th anniversary edition, hopefully to be enjoyed, as it was by me, by many present and future generations' weniger anzeigen expand_less