The first volume of this biography of Daniel O'Connell, "The Hereditary Bondsman", was published to great acclaim in 1988. Now, in "The Emancipist", Oliver MacDonagh tells the story of O'Connell's life from the achievement of Catholic Emancipation in 1829 to his death in 1847. In this book we see a fully professional popular politician, a leading British as well as Irish radical, a first-rank member of the House of Commons, and perhaps the greatest innovator in modern democratic politics.

This volume's central theme is O'Connell's demand for, and campaigns in support of, the repeal of the Act of Union between Great Britain and Ireland. O'Connell's use of Repeal was manifold. He employed it to build up a separate party and bargaining power in Westminster, to stave off revolution at home, and to establish in 1835-41 a form of power-sharing in Ireland which, in his eyes, gave some practical effect to Catholic Emancipation and national dignity. It was an epic struggle against immense odds, and a masterpiece of the political art.

Professor MacDonagh skilfully interweaves the ceaseless twists and turns of O'Connell's public fortunes and his interior and family life. In its power of depiction and analysis, this is a fitting biography for the giant of nineteenth-century Irish history.