Interview: Dr Conor Kostick, historian and children’s author

Interview date: 29 September 2009

What book do you wish you had written?
I’m with Cathy Hayes on this one: A Hundred Years of Solitude by Gabriel Garcia Marquez.

What would you do if you were not a historian?
Well, I divide my time between history and writing fiction as it is, so ‘author’.

When was the last time you looked at wikipedia?
Sometime during the week. Its very handy for authors wanting to get technical details right, like how a combine harvester works. I don’t use it as a historian, it is not yet reliable enough, but a generation from now perhaps …

What event had the greatest impact on history in Ireland?
If an ‘event’ is something very particular rather than a long term trend, then I think the Easter Rising.

What book are you currently reading?
Brian Hanley and Scott Millar’s The Lost Revolution: The Story of the Official IRA and the Workers’ Party, fascinating but depressing: like watching a train wreck in slow motion.

Tags: Conor Kostick