To day was my first time this year to use a camera rather than in iPhone and because it was a sunny day I decided to use a Sigma DP1 Quattro which is difficult to use.
The Lilliput Press is one of Ireland’s smallest and most prestigious publishing houses. They publish a wide variety of Irish interest books and represent authors such as James Joyce, John Moriarty, J.P. Donleavy and many others. They specialise in biography, historical non-fiction and memoir, but are also one of the leading fiction publishers in Ireland and are known for discovering exciting new talents such as Donal Ryan, Rob Doyle and Elske Rahill.
The Lilliput Press was founded in 1984 by Antony Farrell in County Westmeath. Jonathan Swift spent his summers in a house nearby, and derived the name Lilliput from a local townland. The office was moved to its present locale in Arbour Hill, Stoneybatter, Dublin 7, in 1989.
I do not know the history of this shop which ceased trading a number of years ago but the street on which it is located will undergo major changes in the near future as at least two sites are to be redeveloped.
In January planning permission was submitted for a student accommodation complex [541 units] to replace the Park Shopping Centre, The original shopping centre dating from 1984 adjoins the TU university campus which was scheduled to have 20,000 students by the end of 2020 but I am fairly that target has yet to be realised.
It would appear that planning permission has been awarded late in 2020: “Demolition of existing buildings, construction of 585 no. bedspace student accommodation, 16 no. Co-Living apartments, 4 no. townhouses and associated site works.”
I could wrong but there is another student complex underway on the other side of Prussia Street. The Topline Windows & PVC site at 68 Prussia Street has been cleared or is being cleared.
CLARKE’S CITY ARMS PUB AND CITY ARMS HOTEL ON PRUSSIA STREET – FREQUENTED BY JAMES JOYCE
Number 55 on Prussia Street was formerly the City Arms Hotel, previously it was the home of the Jameson family, the well known distillers. I am not sure if the pub was in fact associated with the hotel.
James Joyce frequented the City Arms Hotel when he lived in St. Peters Terrace in Phibsborough. and in Ulysses it is mentioned a number of times. The ‘Joycean’ characters Leopold and Molly Bloom lived in room number ‘9’ from 1893 to 1894 while Bloom was employed as a clerk in the Cattle Market which was situated close to the junction of Prussia Street and the North Circular Road.
The area, often referred to as Cowtown, was at a particular time in history on the edge of the city of Dublin and was the ideal location for the city’s cattle market.
Dublin Corporation had been holding a cattle market in Smithfield, but with the increase in the city’s population and the growth of the cattle export business, Smithfield proved to be too small. In 1863, the market was relocated to the open spaces on the North Circular Road. A number of fine houses were built in the area by successful cattle dealers and at the same time over 250 large houses were built for the ‘professional classes’.
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