The great Irish potato famine

About this book

"The Great Irish Potato Famine provides an accessible, comprehensive account of the famine, combining narrative, analysis, historiography, and scores of contemporary illustrations. It furnishes vivid insights into the misery of the famine and the additional nightmare of the mass evictions that followed. Professor Donnelly aims to answer the numerous vexed questions which have surrounded the subject ever since. Was Britain quilty of genocide against the Irish people, or was British culpability more complex? Could the disaster have been considerably reduced in its dimensions, even if not averted altogether? Scholarly and up-to-date, this book will be required reading for anyone with an interest in Ireland or in the way natural disasters and government responses to them can alter the destiny of nations."--Jacket.