This book is a combination of history, current affairs and political analysis is the definitive account of the Northern Ireland troubles. It examines both the background and the events themselves with an historical understanding and a psychological sympathy. Beginning with a short historical anaylsis before proceeding to a detailed account of life both in Northern Ireland and in the Republic in the 1950s and early 1960s. The violence, when it came in 1968, took everything by surprise and found nobody prepared. This was true equally of the Stormont government, the governments in London and Dublin and the principal religious and social organizations within Northern Ireland itself.