The secret code of Irish names

Jack Russell is the author of the believethedata.org blog, where this article was originally published. Anna Burns’ Milkman is a remarkable book. Based on her experiences growing up in Belfast during the Troubles, it conveys a claustrophobic sense of oppression and suspicion, gossip and control. Words and actions, even objects, are burdened with an oblique symbolism that draws meaning from its sectarian context – the “us” and “them” against...