On the inside cover near the bottom was written, “I love you Benny, always.” I bought it there and then. I think it was love poetry or maybe about herbacious plants. “Good choice,” she said smiling. I saw her Madonna-gap. “I think this might be mine.” “Who’s Benny?” I asked....

Even before the end, short of having to make a full and frank admission, he was prepared to admit to what he called “the occasional flutter.” When the end did come he was, oddly enough, less forthcoming. Now in hindsight I believe he never thought I’d leave. And I did love him, for so long, so ardently. Maybe, in a way, I still do. But I’m not the person I was when we met. Leaving became a possibility and I felt liberated, rejuvenated. But I’ve left a piece of me there with him in that little studio apartment. Perhaps the amount of my soul forever his is languishing beside that bookcase I bought him for his birthday, the one beneath the window. I paid little for it and he’d loved it; yet that which cost me the most he discarded with a gesture of contempt, brushing my hair off my face with the back of his hand. He might as well have hit me square, white-knuckled, for all the good any of it did....

“Yes friends, governments in capitalist society are only committees of the rich to better manage the affairs of the capitalist class.” – James Connolly WorkMustPay is a campaign of young trade unionists and political activists against the JobBridge internship racket. JobBridge is a state scheme which forces young workers to work for periods of 6-9 months for only €50 euro on top of their dole. This is unacceptable. The minimum wage in this state is €8.65 per hour yet interns under the scheme only receive €3.65 on average. The purpose is quite clear: it is to provide employers with slave labour and encourage workers to engage in a race to the bottom against each other. The Department of Social Protection provided interested businesses with a subsidy to take on people from social welfare. This massages unemployment figures and alleviates the burden on the state of providing jobs for people. It is a scheme designed solely to make Joan Burton and her Labour colleagues feel as if they are doing something when in reality what they are doing is destructive. It will only lead more people below the poverty line and more young people to the plane to Australia. If a business has a vacant position then they at least should owe any potential applicant the basic respect of the minimum wage. JobBridge waives that responsibility for employers and promotes a mentality of “Don’t like it, feck off.” Employers have the right to sever any agreement with interns and interns do not have any right to trade union representation. If the intern has any problems with conditions then they have to be silent or will lose even the meagre allowance of €50 a week. This allowance is merely a token amount and in many instances is not...

There are no two words in the English language more harmful than “good job”.  I did not expect much from this movie. A film billed as something along the lines of “an ambitious young jazz drummer’s quest to be the best in his elite music conservatory” did not sound like my sort of thing. I suspected that it would be boring, packed with music in which I had no interest, and played out by a cast led by two actors I had never heard of before. I thought nothing of it. How wrong I was. Oh my God. Whiplash is one of the most intense movies I have ever seen. It is a thrilling drama centred on the relationship of a passionately determined student and his ruthless and abusive teacher, who is prepared to push his pupils beyond the brink of their ability and even the brink of their sanity. Their brutal collisions drive the aspiring drummer to a point of such extreme obsession that his whole life begins to unravel by his own hand. The story is a fascinating analysis of the darker side of dedication and tenacity, and the shocking extremes that people could go to in order to achieve fame. At one point, the main character, Andrew Neiman, says, “I’d rather die broke and drunk at 34 and have people at a dinner table somewhere talk about it than die rich and sober at 90 and have no one remember me.” His relentless pursuit of greatness is spurred on by his teacher, yes – but it is ultimately Andrew himself who brings his life crashing down around him. By the time I reached the end of this film, I could not identify any real protagonist. The best aspects of this movie,...

Living side by side for centuries until two worlds diverge at a centrepoint, Eyes fixed on our Berlin, our Cyprus, our Jerusalem, David’s lies and James’ determination drove scores over the edge, From bogside battles to attempted stormings on Crumlin Road   Second-class citizens in a place only up the road from a majority, Gerrymandering was the order of the day, Devlin’s entry into Stormont was destined to doom, An unwillingness to throw in the towel to subserviance led them to war,   Brothers killing brothers became the common sight on the evening news, The colours were as bright as was the blood lost led us to that eventful Sunday, The day that innocence died and British credibility, Brutal sectarian violence kept hold until our Lord’s holy day   But lest it be forgotten that at night’s end only one track can be forged and that is of the...