Belfast dialogue

(A dialogue between Francis Russell (F.R.) and an old army colleague (G.J.) over the past several weeks. A Cambridge graduate, a teacher for a time at A. S. H. Neill’s Summerhill, G.J. received his PhD in psychology from Harvard after World War 11. Thirteen years ago he went from England to Belfast as a lecturer in psychology at Queen’s University and later became adviser in clinical psychology to the Northern Ireland Hospitals Authority. —Ed.)

WHEN I LIVED IN DUBLIN in 1946 the border seemed to be no longer an active issue but one of those things that would eventually solve itself after an economic equilibrium had been reached between North and South. At that time in the South they were very sensitive about any hint of direct action. There was a small group of IRA fanatics who used money they wheedled from America to persuade country boys to do occasional desperate things, like blowing up those English post-boxes in 1939. But they never made any impression on anyone I knew in Dublin. Nobody seemed to care any more about Ulster. When you went to Ireland, did you find it in the North as I found it 26 years ago in the South? G.J. I found a tendency for people just not to discuss politics. There was a certain amount of Catholic resentment at the way the Protestants ran the show, but no one said much. I had the feeling of an uneasy quiet, that people weren’t satisfied and that the Protestants were alert in case there might be some kind of upsurge against them.

FR

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Francis Russell

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(A dialogue between Francis Russell (F.R.) and an old army colleague (G.J.) over the past several weeks. A Cambridge graduate, a teacher for a time at A. S. H. Neill’s Summerhill, G.J. received his PhD in psychology from Harvard after World War 11. Thirteen years ago he went from England to Belfast as a lecturer in psychology at Queen’s University and later became adviser in clinical psychology to the Northern Ireland Hospitals Authority. —Ed.)

WHEN I LIVED IN DUBLIN in 1946 the border seemed to be no longer an active issue but one of those things that would eventually solve itself after an economic equilibrium had been reached between North and South. At that time in the South they were very sensitive about any hint of direct action. There was a small group of IRA fanatics who used money they wheedled from America to persuade country boys to do occasional desperate things, like blowing up those English post-boxes in 1939. But they never made any impression on anyone I knew in Dublin. Nobody seemed to care any more about Ulster. When you went to Ireland, did you find it in the North as I found it 26 years ago in the South? G.J. I found a tendency for people just not to discuss politics. There was a certain amount of Catholic resentment at the way the Protestants ran the show, but no one said much. I had the feeling of an uneasy quiet, that people weren’t satisfied and that the Protestants were alert in case there might be some kind of upsurge against them.