was not published. Father Shaw,nknown to his friends and students asnFather Frank, died soon after, aged 63,nin December 1970, by which time thentroubles in the north had been renewed.nTwo years after his death Studiesnpublished the article, in the belatednhope of bringing the extremists to theirnsenses.nFather Frank’s argument was blunt.nAt no time had independence fromnBritain been the chief or only goal ofnIrish nationalism. The Irish Party innthe British House of Commons, likenDaniel O’Connell (1775-1847) beforenit, had been consistently against independencenand had sought nothingnmore than local autonomy or homenrule. Meanwhile, Sinn Fein, the politicalnwing of the IRA, had been foundednmainly by Arthur GrifEth as “a constitutional,nnohseparatist association,”nand it had “no connechon with thenRising of 1916.” Some of the leadersnof the Rising, indeed, felt it to benhostile to them, and in any case uselessnand in terminal decline. The implicationnof the article was clear. The IRAncould claim no credit for the act thatnled to the creation of an Irish state inn46/CHRONICLESnLIBERAL ARTSnCAR SURFINGnA “car surfing” accident claimed the lifenof a 16-year-old girl in Wisconsin lastnwinter. According to the Capitol Timesnlast December, Fawn CheyennenMylenbusch was “on her stomach onntop of the roof . . . clinging to the ridgesnin the roof” of a car approachingnspeeds of up to 55 mph when JoninLinster, the driver and a “best” friend,nmade a U-turn causing Mylenbusch tonfall to the road and strike her head.nThose attending the funeral said “carnsurfing was popular among bored teenagers.”nMylenbusch was reportedly anpart of a high school group called then”Too Stupid Society” and had carnsurfed “for more than a year.”n1921.nCredit, nonetheless, had beennclaimed. The confusion apparentlynarose because the name “Sinn Fein”n(“Ourselves Alone”) had somehowncaptured the imagination of the British,nwho came to use it carelessly as anbroad term for Irish nationalists inngeneral. In other words, the Irish mistakenmay have been in its origins anBritish mistake, much as PresidentnRobinson’s official car in April 1991nwas a British car. “It may come as anshock to some readers,” Francis Shawnwrote in the mid-1960’s, to know thatnas long ago as 1919 P.S. O’Hegerty,nwriting a history of Sinn Fein, confessednthat it had “nothing to do withnthe insurrection,” which in inspirationnwas Fenian. The Fenians were romanticnnationalists from the Victorian Age.nOnly one of the seven men who signednthe republican proclamation of 1916,nSean MacDiarmada, had ever in hisnlife been a Sinn Feiner, and he hadnsevered connections years before;nwhile most of the remaining six wouldnhave objected strongly to being identifiednwith that movement. The IRAntook no part in plotting for arms withnnnthe Germans in 1916, seizing thenDublin post office, or killing some 300ncivilians in the Rising, along with 130nBritish troops. Patrick Pearse, executednas a ringleader in May 1916, had toldnArthur Griffith four years before, in annopen letter, that he had “never hadnmuch affection” for Sinn Fein, andnhoped the movement would soon dienout. “It’s about time for them,” henwrote with satisfaction, noting theirndecline in Irish affairs. As the survivorsnof the Rising surrendered to the Britishnin April l9l6 and were led off asnprisoners, an Irish crowd jeered atnthem, spitting on them as traitors whonhad taken innocent Irish lives, wreckednthe main street of Dublin, and collaboratednwith the Germans in time of war;nand it is possible that there were IRAnsupporters there, jeering and spittingnwith the rest.nNone of this is now much remembered,nin Ireland or elsewhere. Thenheroic IRA myth survives, and I doubtnif Father Francis Shaw, that courageousnpriest-professor now twenty years andnmore in his grave, would have been atnall surprised at the near oblivion intonwhich his discovery had fallen. As henmust have known, it is a rare article in anscholarly journal that changes thencourse of events or even the course ofnopinion, and he was a modest man andnnothing of a politician. He loved annargument, however, by all accounts,nthough he is best known as a carefulneditor of medieval Irish texts. A sicklynman, ascetic and humoriess, he spentnmany hours visiting the dying innDublin, eventually becoming a Superiornin his order, and he died uncelebrated,nthough he is shll remembered withnaffection by his colleagues and pupils.nBut if he cannot now speak, at leastnothers can.nIreland, it is said, is in all the woddnthe saddest victim of history. But thenreal cure for bad history is not silencenor the bomb but good history; and atnleast Francis Shaw, in his day, showednhow potent facts can be, if you letnthem, and how much the past can donto enslave or make us free.nGeorge Watson, a fellow of St. John’snCollege, Cambridge, is the authornof Tbe Literary Critics (Chatto),nWriting a Thesis (Longman), andnBritish Literature Since 1945n(St. Martin’s).n