Ireland’s amateur drama groups: ‘I think it is every bit as good as a professional production’
Amateur dramatic groups have had a strong presence in Irish life for decades
Weekend
Stories that appear in the Weekend section of The Irish Times print edition
American money is destroying the Irish economy from the inside
Ireland is dangerously overdependent on a small number of companies for far too much revenue
British ambassador Kara Owen: ‘There is one particular part of Ireland I’d always go to. It is beautiful’
Kara Owen: The British ambassador to Ireland on her strongest childhood memory, her favourite Irish restaurant, and the actor she would like to play her in a biopic of her life
Chuck Feeney, the billionaire who gave Ireland $1.93bn, was the opposite of Trump
Atlantic Philanthropies made 1,616 grants to the island of Ireland totalling $1.93 billion. Its departure left a void that has been hard to fill
Scouts get their hands dirty in push to restore biodiversity at Lough Dan
Group was joined at Wicklow site by An Taisce CEO Gary Freemantle for symbolic planting of 8,000th tree
Keith Duggan’s journey through America: The farther west you go the less real Trump becomes
US250: the country is in the grip of a long winter and an extended moment of uncertainty
Ecologists are leaving the field as AI moves in
Technology is revolutionising how we gather and assess data on nature, presenting huge benefits and no little irony
Should I be worried about this mushroom on my wall?
Eye on Nature: Eanna Ní Lamhna on a quick-growing fungus, an eagle sighting and a sea mouse
‘Right now it’s only a positive if you are Irish in London,’ say Hot Dinners and Murphia List founders
Siblings behind food blog Hot Dinners and Murphia List discuss rise of Irish talent in London hospitality scene
‘Tourette syndrome is like blinking: the urge is too strong to control’
The man at the centre of the Bafta racial slur controversy said he was ‘deeply mortified’ if anyone considered his tics intentional
My dog died two months ago and the gap he has left in all our lives is unfathomable
John Deane-O’Keefe: Forensic criminologist and author on his middle name and his Basil Fawlty-like anger issues
Sometimes we should be unreasonable – it allows in sorrow, hope and joy
The word ‘reason’, like ‘natural’ and ‘common sense’, often alerts us to a hidden agenda
The trouble with the Deposit Return Scheme: ‘They’re sitting on a pile of unclaimed deposits’
As Irish households get used to retaining empty receptacles, smaller producers raise concerns about the workload
Irish people tend to underestimate impact of meat-free diet on our carbon footprint
How much time we spend talking about climate change measures may be key to better understanding
56 Days author Catherine Ryan Howard: ‘The premiere of the Amazon show ‘was just pure joy’
Prior to streaming, the trailer for Amazon Prime’s adaptation of Ryan Howard’s novel 56 Days had more than 78m views. It’s a ‘fever dream’ for her
Performative grief: Chappell Roan and Apple Martin learned the hard way about overblown sorrow
As people feel the need to pay social media tribute when a celebrity dies it’s impossible not to feel that the idea of sombre remembrance has been corrupted
Irish in America: ‘I carry my US passport, use a burner phone and have an escape plan’
Legal Irish-born immigrants still live with an underlying sense of fear as Ice increases the scope of its raids
Castle Leslie: A divided estate, a nightclub, a ‘hippie colony’ and now a thriving hotel
The estate, which runs alongside the Border in Co Monaghan, has borne the Leslie name for 400 years and is ‘part and parcel of the community’
Irish grandmother detained by Ice: ‘If I am the worst of the worst then America has a bigger problem than it thinks’
Donna Hughes Brown was detained by Ice officials at Chicago airport when returning home from Ireland last July. Now she has a list of people she is fighting for
Is this swan’s discolouration a Suir thing?
Éanna Ní Lamhna replies to readers’ questions and observations
Ireland’s low urban population has left us with a problem of extreme commuting
As Clare and Tipperary people know, Ireland has become a country of sprawl, of suburbs creeping into countryside and towns and villages choked with traffic
Ireland’s aspen may not be as lonely as feared, but it is overlooked and under pressure
With this native tree threatened by overgrazing, experts have set up a clone bank in Co Wexford
What are the latest developments with proposed new social media laws?
Government has already announced trial of ‘digital wallet’ age verification mechanism for accessing platforms
Nervously tracking my son’s flight I realise the freedom in embracing not knowing
In most situations, data promotes safety only when someone knows what to do about it
Lent offers a chance to develop a habit good for your pocket and for the planet
With food prices escalating as they are, freezing eggs for a year could even be an act of financial hedging
It was an era of body-moralising in Ireland, when obesity was a personal failure
In a culture that treats bodies as projects to be improved, the idea of simply caring for them feels almost radical
Soprano Celine Byrne: ‘I’m very good at masking my feelings for the sake of somebody else’
The Irish singer on her happiest times, being haunted by memories of working on the bog, and how the death of her father changed her
Mary Black: ‘It’s beginning to sink in, this goodbye is a bigger deal than I thought’
It’s the last Irish tour and the end of an era for the national treasure as she prepares to take her final bow
Multilingual families: ‘Many still feel pressure to leave parts of themselves at the door’
More than 70 languages are spoken in Ireland and the Mother Tongues festival is helping pass them on to the next generation
Online dating at midlife: ‘He wanted me to drive from north Dublin to Wicklow for sex at 2am’
As people in Ireland settle down later than ever, more people in their 40s and 50s are turning to apps to find love online
Haughey, Streep and the Queen of Tory: Donegal photographer hangs up his camera after four decades
Four-hundred photographs from veteran photojournalist Declan Doherty are on exhibition in Donegal
Is climate change responsible for this sighting of a butterfly in winter?
Eye on Nature: Éanna Ní Lamhna on a migrant insect, a native dipper, and a toothy-looking animal horn
What’s happening with the basic income for artists scheme?
An artist’s alliance says changes to the pilot scheme are causing ‘enormous distress’ among current recipients
The lichen test: what these colonies tell us about the health of a habitat
Lichens can survive nearly everything - even long periods in outer space - but pollution will kill them
Crosswords & Puzzles
Crosswords & puzzles to keep you challenged and entertained
Common Ground
How does a post-Brexit world shape the identity and relationship of these islands
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