for reminding me in an Irishman’s Diary last month about German Nobel prize winning writer Heinrich Böll. Sixty years ago, in 1957, his book An Irish Journal was published and helped shape Germany’s uber-tinted views of Ireland thereafter. But we had no money and it was never our custom then to allow the law get between us and necessity. Now we ‘indomitable Irishry’ seem “devastated” all the time. Devastated from Latin devastare “to lay waste completely,” from de- “completely” + vastare “lay waste”.

Source: The Irish Times January 20, 2018 00:00 UTC