Anna Lively, "Revolutionary Connections: Russia and Ireland, 1905-1923" (Oxford UP, 2026)

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Introducing Meta Glasses.

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You have questions, they've got answers.

**Aidan Beattie** (0:05)
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**Anna Lively** (0:08)
Lima.

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**Anna Lively** (0:18)
Spiritually, yes.

**Aidan Beattie** (0:20)
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**Anna Lively** (0:23)
That's one of life's biggest questions. What do you think?

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**Anna Lively** (0:31)
Latte for Keenan?

**Aidan Beattie** (0:33)
That's me.

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**Aidan Beattie** (0:35)
Yeah.

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Really?

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But unlike other sites, you can start online, test drive with a local dealer, then finish online or at the dealership. Really?

**Aidan Beattie** (0:45)
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**Anna Lively** (0:46)
Yep, it's Keenan.

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Able to finish in person without starting the process over? Really? Your info stays with you every step of the way.

**SPEAKER_2** (0:52)
Cool.

**Anna Lively** (0:53)
Enjoy. It's Keenan Thompson.

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**Aidan Beattie** (1:31)
Welcome to The New Books Network.
Hello and welcome to New Books in Irish Studies, a podcast channel in the New Books Network. My name is Aidan Beattie. I'm one of the co-hosts of this channel.
Today we're talking to Dr. Anna Lively, a historian of modern Ireland, Britain and Russia, award her PhD in history from the University of Edinburgh in 2022 She's currently a Liverhome Early Career Fellow in History at the University of Strathclyde. Prior to this, she held the Roy Foster Irish Government Research Fellowship in the History and Culture of Ireland at Hertford College at the University of Oxford, and was a Teaching Fellow in Modern History at the University of Aberdeen. She has published in multiple journals on the Centenary of the Russian Revolution of 1917, and on the Irish Save the Children Fund. Her new book, which we'll be discussing today, is Revolutionary Connections Russia and Ireland 1905 to 1923 Anna, thanks so much for being here.

**Anna Lively** (2:25)
Well, thanks so much for having me.

**Aidan Beattie** (2:27)
So maybe we could just jump right into the deep end. What were the connections between radicals in Ireland and Russia?
I'm somewhat aware of maybe the connections that people like Roddy Connolly had with Lenin, but how do the connections you're studying go beyond that?

**Anna Lively** (2:42)
Yeah, so I guess radical connections between Russia and Ireland are really developing in a big range of contexts, and obviously in the Irish diaspora as well as in Ireland itself.
I guess because Russian and Irish radicals are often by necessity, so geographically mobile, in the late 19th century and early 20th century, you see connections emerging from that. So for example, in places like London and New York, through print and different political organizations. But I guess I was struck when I was doing the research as well by how broad the different types of interactions are. So also including religious groups and liberals, Ulster Unionists and also connections formed during World War I.

**Aidan Beattie** (3:25)
So I think there's almost like the obvious things that we, certainly Irish historians would not be totally surprised by, Lenin wrote on the Easter Rising and things like that. And even if you didn't know that, it kind of makes sense that he would write about that, would be interested in that.
But then you do have these things like Ulster Unionists, that we would never think of having any interest whatsoever in Russia, and certainly not in Russian radicals. And seeing those connections I think is really interesting. And maybe somewhat related to that, early on in the book you mentioned that there are certain kinds of Russian attitudes, Russian responses, Russian perceptions of the Land War and the Home Rule Movement. And could you maybe just talk us through that? What did Russians think about these events? What did they get right about it? What did they get wrong?

**Anna Lively** (4:13)
Yeah, so the Irish Land War really provokes a lot of interest in the Russian Empire, and also internationally, including through interest in boycotts, and interest in different forms of resistance to landlordism. There's a really strong sense in terms of being able to learn lessons from the Irish example that you might then be able to apply in the Russian Empire.
There's one Russian economist and professor I look at called Alexander Manulov, who he's so interested in Irish land questions that he goes to Ireland and Britain in the 1890s to carry out all this research, which he then uses to help write liberal cadet policy in Russia. This is very direct, trying to learn from it. Lenin as well is writing about how all land is being transferred to the hands of the farmers in Ireland. He contrasts this to the situation in Russia in the aftermath of the 1905 Revolution. I guess this really strong sense of Ireland is a positive example in terms of the land wars. But perhaps because of that, wanting to learn lessons, sometimes a simplification or a sense of everything having been resolved, ignoring the kind of underlying inequalities that there still were.