MIKE CARNEY describes his birthplace as the ‘’most beautiful place on earth’’.

THROUGH my work-room window, I look out at the mist hanging over the field beyond the beeches and my imaginings of an Indian summer are dissolved in water-vapour so dense the horses are like spectres walking riderless through cannon-smoke, lost in a region between heaven and hell.

ONE of the last surviving natives of the Great Blasket Island, Micheál O Cearna, 89, was last evening conferred with an honorary doctorate of literature.

Donal Hickey on protecting wildlife on the Blaskets.

A ROW has broken out among Dublin councillors over a proposal to name the Dublin Port Tunnel in honour of Charles Haughey.