01 December 2020 - New RTE documentary finds evidence of cannibalism in Ireland during Great Famine
‘Bodies left for weeks. People eaten by dogs’: What the Famine did to Ireland
Ed Power (The Irish Times, 30/11/2020)
The Hunger: The Story of the Irish Famine (RTÉ One, Monday, 9.35pm) is a thoroughly conventional retelling of one of the darkest chapters in Irish history – and it is all the better for it. Featuring quietly authoritative narration by Liam Neeson and the customary talking-head historians, it is as solid and traditional as a piece of heirloom furniture.
Neeson, accompanied by moody panning shots of the Irish landscape, takes us from the origins of the Famine up to “Black ’47”, the bleakest year of this incomprehensible calamity. Conjuring up his finest “I will look for you, I will find you” growl, from his Taken movies, he describes how, impoverished and downtrodden, Ireland was already teetering before the potato blight struck.
Why you need to watch this new documentary on the Great Famine
John Crowley (RTE, 01/12/2020)
This year marks the 175th anniversary of the beginning of the Great Irish Famine (1845-1852) which resulted in the deaths of over one million people and the scattering of one million and quarter across the globe. It was a large-scale humanitarian disaster with tragic consequences, especially for those classes at the bottom of the social ladder: the cottiers and landless labourers whose families were almost entirely dependent on the potato for their survival.
Role of ‘survivor cannibalism’ during Great Famine detailed in new TV documentary
Ronan McGreevy (The Irish Times, 30/11/2020)
The lengths to which Irish people went to stay alive including cannibalism have been detailed in a new documentary on the Great Famine.
Entitled The Hunger: The Story of the Irish Famine, it the first major documentary by RTÉ exclusively about the calamity and is being brought out to mark the 175th anniversary of its beginning in 1845.
Things became so bad in “Black 1847” with further famines in 1848 and 1849 that people were reduced to eating putrid pigs, donkeys and dogs.
Liam Neeson to bring the Famine to life in two-part documentary
Fiona Dillon (Independent, 30/11/2020)
Hollywood star Liam Neeson will narrate a major two-part documentary on the Famine, which begins tonight.
RTÉ announced the launch of a landmark new series to mark the 175th anniversary since the start of the Great Irish Famine.
The two-part series, The Hunger: The Story of the Irish Famine, will provide a comprehensive guide to one of the most defining events in our history.