Conor Larkin, belongs to the Catholic hill farmers from the fictional town of Ballyutogue in County Donegal, and grows up in an Ireland under the rule of the British. As he witnesses the plight of the Irish Roman Catholics (RCs) he becomes dedicated to breaking the political link between Ireland and Britain by joining the revolutionary group the Irish Republican Brotherhood, the roots of Sinn Féin, in a bitter struggle for Irish independence. The book is set from 1885 to 1915. It is the first novel to dispel the myth that the Catholic/Protestant conflict is a Holy War; Uris categorically locates the source of Ireland’s misery in the unholy alliance between English imperialism and Irish capitalism. Although,it's classified as fiction, all the major historical references in the story are fact. To imagine how they must have gone on in the face of utter hopelessness with only the aim of gaining some dignity, is commendable.
"… in Ireland, there is no future,” writes Uris, “only the past happening over and over.”
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