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Remembering the ‘otherworldly, rock’n’roll and anti-establishment’ Sinéad O’Connor

IT Sunday: In a week where Ireland lost one of its greatest ever singers, the realities of climate change continued to dominate news headlines

One time use only for Sinead supplement 29th July 2023 by kind permission of BP Fallon sent to Fitzsimons

Acclaimed singer Sinéad O'Connor died on Wednesday at the age of 56. Photograph: BP Fallon

Sun Jul 30 2023 - 08:49

Welcome to this week’s IT Sunday, a selection of the best Irish Times journalism for our subscribers.

On Wednesday the news broke that Sinéad O’Connor had died at the age of 56. In a statement, the singer’s family said: “It is with great sadness that we announce the passing of our beloved Sinéad. Her family and friends are devastated and have requested privacy at this very difficult time.”

The acclaimed Dublin performer released 10 studio albums, while her song Nothing Compares 2 U was named the number one world single in 1990 by the Billboard Music Awards. Her version of the ballad, written by musician Prince, topped the charts around the globe and earned her three Grammy nominations.

This weekend The Irish Times published a special eight-page supplement on the singer with voices from around the world contributing. In the main article, Róisín Ingle - who interviewed the singer on a number of occasions - writes that instead of being celebrated, O’Connor was mocked, dismissed and derided for far too long.

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“We were young, female and Irish. We didn’t know what exactly was eating us or what to do with our demons. But when she sang, it felt like this girl from Glenageary might be able to show us the way. We only had to listen,” she writes.

In another tribute, former Late Late Show host Ryan Tubridy remembers an unlikely friend, writing “I’ll never understand how Sinéad and myself became friends. She was otherworldly, insanely rock’n’roll and anti-establishment, while I was pretty much the opposite of that.”

To read all of our Sinéad O’Connor coverage, including all pieces from this weekend’s supplement, click here.

Meanwhile, as wildfires continued to burn across Europe and north Africa this week, the realities of climate change became clearer. It was a week in which secretary general of the United Nations António Guterres said that the “era of global boiling is here”, while a group of scientists from the University of Copenhagen released research claiming that the Gulf Stream may collapse by 2025 - the first time that has happened in 12,000 years. While other scientists disagree that this tipping point could come as soon as 2025, all are of the view that a collapse must be avoided at all costs. Then, towards the end of the week, we learned that July is set to be the world’s hottest month on record. To put it all into context, environment correspondent Kevin O’Sullivan writes that a week of climate hell has exposed the planet’s vulnerability and shown us that nowhere will be unaffected.

It is the topic of climate change, on which Fintan O’Toole is focusing in his column this weekend, writing that our habit of jetting off to sun holidays won’t end well, but at the moment there is too much money and too many jobs to be sacrificed.

“It’s hard to get our heads around the reality that, because we have wasted so much time in recognising the consequences of human-induced climate change, much of what we have come to take for granted is becoming impossible. Hard, too, to look out on the horizontal Irish rain in July and thank the invisible stars for our good fortune,” he writes.

On a similar topic, David McWilliams writes that the case for nuclear power is at its strongest since Robert Oppenheimer, something we’ve all been reminded of since last weekend’s release of the Cillian Murphy-led blockbuster. “Climate change requires we move away from burning fossil fuels and, slowly but surely, the nuclear option is back on the table. The economics of nuclear power are not straightforward but there is a growing realisation, even from the environmental movement, that nuclear is a clean, efficient alternative and should be part of the mix of solutions,” he writes.

Moving on, the All-Ireland football final takes centre stage this weekend as Dublin meet Kerry in Croke Park on Sunday. As part of our extensive build-up, Darragh Ó Sé writes that Kerry will have to grapple Dublin at every level, but the last 10 minutes will be crucial, while Jim McGuinness writes that Jack O’Connor speaks about playing open football but the reality is that Kerry will need to be more conservative against Dublin.

In our advice columns this week, Trish Murphy responds to a reader who writes that ‘my family don’t particularly like me and I despair about retiring and spending more time with them’, while a reader writes to Roe McDermott about a recent 18-month relationship which ended when they found out that their partner was, in fact, married with children - the fourth time such a thing has happened to the reader.

In this week’s restaurant review, Corinna Hardgrave visits Homestead Cottage in Doolin, Co Clare, a spot she describes as “an incredibly beautiful new restaurant from a talented chef”. Meanwhile, in this week’s Parenting in my Shoes, Jen Hogan speaks to RTÉ presenter Claire Byrne about her experiences of childbirth after being child-free up until the age of 38.

In this week’s On the Money newsletter, Dominic Coyle looks at how the housing crisis is causing Airbnb rules to tighten up. Sign up here to receive the newsletter straight to your inbox every Friday.

As always, there is much more on irishtimes.com, including rundowns of all the latest movies in our film reviews, tips for the best restaurants in our food section and all the latest in sport. There are plenty more articles exclusively available for Irish Times subscribers here.

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