Fearless! Vincent Browne’s Magill and Ireland in the 1980s: Skilful acknowledgment of a valuable legacy

Fearless! Vincent Browne’s Magill and Ireland in the 1980s Author: Kevin RafterISBN-13: 9781835940433Publisher: New IslandGuideline Price: €19.95; 376ppBooks written by Irish journalists are plentiful (your reviewer pleads guilty to several such offences himself), but books about Irish journalists are rare. Yet, if today’s news wraps tomorrow’s fish and chips, it is also true that those who report and curate the news rarely figure in the social narrative.Vincent Browne is one of the exceptions. For five decades, this – let us say – unusual man has been, in Kevin Rafter’s words, the major “disrupter in the Irish media landscape”, focusing on the darker, problematic aspects of Irish society, juggling resources to keep successive publications afloat and launching the careers of many influential journalists.He was arguably at both his strongest and his weakest when he acquired The Sunday Tribune, with the backing of Tony Ryan, in 1983, spreading his energy and influence across a range of publications. The Tribune finally closed in 2011. Others would argue that he was most influential presenting Tonight with Vincent Browne on TV3.Rafter’s book, however, is more than a profile of a mercurial, socially conscious editor, publisher and broadcaster. It narrates a changing, awakening Ireland, starting to demand accountability in public life; the emergence of a new, questioning assertiveness in the news media; and a gathering impetus towards liberalism and tolerance. It is a helicopter view of an Ireland of repression, political corruption, boom-and-bust economics and the cancerous effects of paramilitary violence and crime.READ MORERafter’s narrative is primarily through the lens of Magill magazine, founded in 1977 and surviving (albeit with interruptions) until around 2010. Although he had worked briefly for the Independent and Press groups, Browne chose to place himself outside of mainstream Irish journalism – still largely staid, cautious and conservative, notwithstanding some stirrings of change.Having raised modest capital from some friends and collaborators, Browne hired journalists who had not come through the conventional training channels. He chose writers, campaigners, politically aware products of the disquieted generations. In the grudgingly admiring words of one newspaper traditionalist, they were young people who “did not know their place”.Few had any background in media. John Waters drove a delivery van; Gene Kerrigan was a cinema projectionist; Fintan O’Toole was a drama critic. Under Browne’s direction they harassed the establishment, focusing on abuses of authority, political corruption, clerical repression, social exclusion and inequality. Editors he appointed at Magill included Waters, O’Toole, Colm Tóibín and Brian Trench. [ New 'Magill' owner no political animalOpens in new window ]But while working and living at Magill was exciting, it was often painful – and a great many were unable to endure it. Browne is a man of enormous generosity and compassion. But he could be tyrannical, idiosyncratic and capricious, overruling editors and not infrequently undermining the confidence of young journalists who often worked extraordinarily long hours with, at best, moderate pay and no job security.Nonetheless, he set many of them on hugely successful career pathways. Their verve, energy and sense of vocation were welcome, certainly in the newsroom of The Irish Times, although for some there had to be a degree of reconditioning. The rigorous fact-checking and the requirements of balance and fairness, long embedded in the newspaper’s value system, sometimes took a bit of getting used to.Browne’s journalism and his publications, notably Magill, set a challenge to mainstream Irish news media, although the newspapers and RTÉ had begun to move onThe author deals at some length with the paradoxical relationship between Browne and Charles Haughey. The latter’s lifestyle, persona and wealth were the recurring focus of Browne’s half-century of journalism. (His book Charles Haughey: Glory, Greed and Guns, is due for publication in October.) Browne would frequently confront Haughey at press conferences and demand to know where he got his money. Haughey would contemptuously wave the questions away. Rafter reveals the enigmatic offstage connectivity between the two men: supportive private notes from Browne, almost sycophantic at times; gifts exchanged at Christmas; carefully crafted condolences at times of family bereavement.[ Why the Phoenix magazine failed after 43 years of pestering those in powerOpens in new window ]Browne’s journalism and his publications, notably Magill, set a challenge to mainstream Irish news media, although the newspapers and RTÉ had begun to move on. Journalists such as Michael Viney at The Irish Times, Joe McAnthony at the Irish Independent and the 7 Days team at RTÉ were already pushing the envelope on malpractices, inequality and scandal. Simultaneously, a cohort of young women writers across the mainstream media were highlighting repression and inequality imposed by Church and State.Magill’s journalism took risks that other media often believed they could not afford because of the draconian laws on defamation and contempt. It might be said of Browne that although sometimes he might not have had all the facts correct, he invariably got the essence of the story right. He and those who worked alongside him leave a valuable legacy. This latest work by Rafter, who has penetratingly chronicled many important aspects of Irish public life, has respectfully and skilfully acknowledged it. Conor Brady is a former editor of The Irish Times. His book Resetting the Republic will be published by Full Set Books in November