Overview

A haunting and brilliantly researched history which interrogates the culture of shame in Ireland, and tells the full story, for the first time, of the women confined within the walls of the Magdalene Laundries in the 20th century. Everyone familiar with Ireland's history has heard of the Magdalene Laundries, places where ""fallen"" women were sent for reform, but few understand that the Laundries were part of a larger carceral system in Ireland. There were prisons, but also asylums, industrial and reformatory schools, Mother and Baby Homes, and County Homes, each of which operated alongside the Magdalene Laundries. Taken together, this system of confinement held over one percent of the Irish population, a staggering rate that outstrips the current rate of mass incarceration in the United States. The Magdalene Laundries specifically targeted towards women, and the actions that could necessitate a woman's reform were vast: wearing a short skirt, smoking, defiance, or, most troubling, pregnancy out of wedlock. Women were taken off the street, admitted by their families, or sent by the state when a girl had no family. Once a woman entered the system, it was almost impossible to leave. In writing this book, Louise Brangan has pulled the curtain back on the insecurities of a young nation, showing that Ireland believed that if women could be controlled, so could an entire populace. She shares the stories of the girls who were kept there: Eileen, who was born into a Mother and Baby Home; Carmel, who was forced to take a new name when she entered the Laundries; Brigid, so broken by twenty-seven years on the inside of a laundry, who discovered that once she was released she was completely unsuited to life in everyday society. These stories, taken directly from the historical record, restore the dignity of the women who were sent away and recontextualize the decades that the Laundries acted as a de facto carceral system for the women of Ireland. This has remained one of the darkest and most misunderstood periods of recent history. The Fallen compels us not only to confront this shameful past, but to ask a deeper question: what do we choose to remember?

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9781668079744

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Reviews

""A wrenching reminder that human injustice repeats in the dark corners of human history--and a call to remain attentive.""--Kirkus Review ""Brangan's remarkable book, thrumming with rage and harrowing to read, is a monument to those women and their suffering.""--The Times ""[D]etailed, thoroughgoing...superb...""--John Banville in The Guardian ""Brangan's style is lucid, there's none of the clunkiness of academic writing. It feels part novel, part sociology lecture, part accessible legal review ... She is an accomplished communicator, the reader feels like they are accompanying her as she burrows into the conditions of the soil from which the laundries grew ... This meticulously researched book ... helps us see more clearly""--Irish Independent ""[A] highly readable and intelligently engaging account of this systemic injustice, and it should prompt a wider reflection both inside and beyond Ireland on the ways in which societies can become inured to the evil all around them. For the resurgent Christian nationalists across the western world who long for a return to semi-theocratic government, it has a stark lesson: be careful what you wish for.""--Fintan O'Toole, New York Times bestselling author of We Don't Know Ourselves Compelling, measured and deeply felt; Brangan cuts through shame and fable to tell the truth about the 'inconvenient' women whose lives were stolen by the Magdalene Laundries. Indispensable. -- Anne Enright, author of THE GATHERING A terrific yet harrowing unearthing of Ireland's shadowland. I thought I knew about the Magdalene Laundries. I was wrong. Brangan's chronicle is limpid, eloquent and devastating. A landmark book. -- Rory Carroll, author of KILLING THATCHER Breaking silence is a catalyst for change and the lived experiences of survivors in this book demand a reckoning, challenging us to ask ourselves what systemic injustices we are normalising to this day. -- Caelainn Hogan, author of REPUBLIC OF SHAME

""A wrenching reminder that human injustice repeats in the dark corners of human history--and a call to remain attentive.""--Kirkus Review ""Brangan's remarkable book, thrumming with rage and harrowing to read, is a monument to those women and their suffering.""--The Times ""[D]etailed, thoroughgoing...superb...""--John Banville in The Guardian Compelling, measured and deeply felt; Brangan cuts through shame and fable to tell the truth about the 'inconvenient' women whose lives were stolen by the Magdalene Laundries. Indispensable. -- Anne Enright, author of THE GATHERING A terrific yet harrowing unearthing of Ireland's shadowland. I thought I knew about the Magdalene Laundries. I was wrong. Brangan's chronicle is limpid, eloquent and devastating. A landmark book. -- Rory Carroll, author of KILLING THATCHER Breaking silence is a catalyst for change and the lived experiences of survivors in this book demand a reckoning, challenging us to ask ourselves what systemic injustices we are normalising to this day. -- Caelainn Hogan, author of REPUBLIC OF SHAME

Compelling, measured and deeply felt; Brangan cuts through shame and fable to tell the truth about the 'inconvenient' women whose lives were stolen by the Magdalene Laundries. Indispensable. -- Anne Enright, author of THE GATHERING A terrific yet harrowing unearthing of Ireland's shadowland. I thought I knew about the Magdalene Laundries. I was wrong. Brangan's chronicle is limpid, eloquent and devastating. A landmark book. -- Rory Carroll, author of KILLING THATCHER Breaking silence is a catalyst for change and the lived experiences of survivors in this book demand a reckoning, challenging us to ask ourselves what systemic injustices we are normalising to this day. -- Caelainn Hogan, author of REPUBLIC OF SHAME A wrenching reminder that human injustice repeats in the dark corners of human history--and a call to remain attentive.""--Kirkus Review

Author Information

Dr. Louise Brangan is an Irish academic who researches injustice and punishment. She is a 2023 BBC/AHRC New Generation Thinker, the playwright of The Ireland We Dreamed Of, and winner of the 2024 RSL Giles St Aubyn Award. She lives and works in Scotland.

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