Jack Lane interviews Paul R. Hyde, author of Anatomy of a lie.

Jack Lane is founder of the Aubane Historical Society and his interest in the Casement story began in 1965 in Cork.

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JL: How do you explain the new interest in Casement with two new biographies and their fulsome praise by the press?

PH: I don’t think it is new interest in Casement. Broken Archangel appeared two years ago and the Rory Carroll volume came out this year in March. Both were heavily promoted in Ireland as well as the UK. All but one of the press reviews were written by non-entities, not by people knowledgeable about Casement and the reason would be obvious to a ten-year-old. Praise from a known expert gives the author prestige and sells their book. I reviewed the Philipps book in Village magazine and I pointed out how the author deceived readers by making no mention of the fact that no diaries were shown in 1916, that only the police typescripts were shown. There were no diaries in 1916. Both books are shamefully dishonest and biased. My review of Carroll’s book was published in the May edition of Irish Political Review. But the real answer lies in the timing of these books. The new edition of Anatomy of a lie went on sale in May 2023 after being unavailable for about three years. There was no advance publicity – it just appeared. Then only ten months later Philipps’ book arrived and only eleven months after that Carroll’s book was launched to enormous publicity. Neither author had ever published on Casement before or shown any interest in him. Both books are intended to repair the damage caused by the wholly unexpected re-appearance of Anatomy of a lie. 

JL: There has been a very thorough debate in the Irish Political Review with Jeff Dudgeon on the issue of there being no independent witnesses for the Black Diaries existence in 1916. How would you sum up the outcome?

PH: The outcome was astonishing. I can only describe it as the collapse of the authenticity position. Bearing in mind that Dudgeon was the legendary defender of authenticity for more than thirty years and had been unchallenged, then we have to regard this as an earthquake. He has admitted the diaries might be forged and at the same time he has admitted that no independent witnesses to the existence of the diaries can be named. Not one. After over three decades of research he can’t name a single witness. He has nuked authenticity. He can no longer hope to defend it and can no longer pretend the diaries existed in 1916.

 JL: Did you foresee this collapse?

PH: Not in a million years. Authenticity was the raison d’ être of his life. In short, he has demolished his own position and decoded himself.  He now says ‘I can’t prove them genuine and I can’t prove they existed at the time.’ A kind of suicide. Without proof of existence, there can’t be any claim about authenticity.

JL: When we discussed this second interview you referred to President Connolly.

PH: Yes, the most recent development concerns President Connolly whose behaviour perplexes me. You’ll recall I offered her a complimentary copy of Anatomy of a lie back in March when she was invited to speak at the Casement Summer School in May.

JL: I remember. But then nothing happened?

PH: Nothing happened. She ignored the offer, never replied. I got distracted then by Dudgeon’s letters and the dramatic impact they had on the controversy. Then in mid-May I heard the president’s speech at the Summer School.

JL: What did you think?

PH: Well, I was astonished, no shocked – had to listen twice to be sure I was hearing correctly – the audio wasn’t great.

JL: Shocked by what?

PH: Shocked by several gaffes she made but more because she obviously knew very little about the Casement story – in fact, she admitted knowing little. But she’s the head of state.

JL: Perhaps modesty?

PH: I tried that but it doesn’t fit. Let me explain. She conceded unwittingly by default that she had read nothing about Casement, not Inglis or O’ Siochain or Sawyer … so many books out there …  and then said she was in fact reading those awful books by Carroll and Philipps with a view “to doing my best  to build on my knowledge” as she put it. But if she had read the earlier works she certainly wouldn’t need to waste time on the recent books. So it means that when invited in March to the event, she had no interest in Casement, had read nothing and therefore knew nothing. So not modesty. She was confessing to her own ignorance.

JL: You were not impressed by the quality of her speech to the Summer School?

PH: Far from impressed. She got the execution date wrong. She made a bizarre reference to the Foreign Legion. She also proclaimed “his homosexuality” as if it was a verified fact – more evidence of prejudice. Her embarrassing admission near the end that she knew little about Casement was cut from her website text. She had over two months to prepare this ten-minute speech but the platitudes and clichés glue together vacuous biographical details well known to seasoned Casement fans. Most of the gaffes disappeared from the official text on her website.

JL: But she did express admiration for Casement.

PH: You’re right, she did. But everybody admires Casement most of all those who know little and who have not read the diaries.

JL: What do you mean?

PH: Reading the diaries would compel them to decide if he was worthy of their admiration. We can be sure that the president has not read the diaries since she refuses even to read my book. She’d find the diaries depict a Casement who is clearly a sexual predator addicted to underage prostitutes. The sexual relations are mostly of this pederast type. Obsessed with male genitals and prey to unceasing carnal appetite for youths, often adolescents, the diarist is incapable of self control, ordinary discretion, is without caution or awareness.  It is difficult to attribute to this predatory pederast any moral values since his behaviour is consistent with the final stages of a grave neurological disorder.  The 1911 typescript convinced two psychiatrists that his advanced illness marked him “undoubtedly as a mentally abnormal individual …” who was driven by indiscriminate and uncontrollable homosexual desire, clearly the promiscuous victim of an insatiable craving. Today he would be a registered sex offender, quite unemployable, probably convicted of statutory rape and probably hospitalized.

JL: You’ve described a psychopath. Do you think that’s the Casement she admires?

PH: That’s the Casement in the diaries and she admires Casement.

JL: But surely not?

PH: Well, if not she needs to say so and tell us she admires a different Casement.

JL: You mean, I suppose, a Casement who didn’t write the diaries?

PH: I guess so. It’s her problem, not mine. But after no reply to a reminder about the first mail in March, I decided to try a different approach with an open letter. I asked her to explain why she refuses to read Anatomy of a lie and invited her to break the omertà about the diaries. That was sent by email on 27th of July but there was no reply. I wrote again – a private letter this time asking her to confirm her opinion that the diaries were genuine. But on 24th August, my attempts to send the mail were rejected automatically. A third-party check verified that the president had blocked my address and cut me off. This might be unusual, perhaps rare but it is quite legal. The president’s role is merely ceremonial and representative not of the electors but of state institutions. So the president has no duty to the people who elect him or her and is not obliged to communicate with them. It’s a travesty of the concept of a popular vote.

JL: So the head of state is hostile to the book and to all the research you’ve done over ten years and refuses to explain her motives.

PH: Yes, it’s incoherent and it contradicts the spirit of an open society, of democracy and freedom of expression. She described herself as a president for all who “listens and reflects” and engages in “constructive questioning”, who is “not afraid to stand against the consensus”. All deeply cynical jargon protecting the politics of omertà.

JL: What’s behind it all?

PH: Her refusal to read the book is motivated by a strong prejudice and prejudice is very common. Even some who believe the diaries are forgeries do so out of prejudice and not because of evidence and logic. Ignorance plays a part both ways. Recently a member of the RCSS committee told me she’s read nothing about Casement but believes in forgery because her family always believed that.

JL: That’s a clear example of prejudice. But where would the president get her prejudice?

PH: I don’t know the origin of Connolly’s prejudice but it has clearly taken possession of her to the extent of blocking the critical faculty which usually monitors mental functioning and decisions.

JL: Surely she has a point of view even if not well-informed?

PH: We can’t assess her point of view because she hasn’t expressed any judgment or opinion. We only have this unexplained total hostility to a book she refuses to read.

JL: That fact makes it look like a closed mind.

PH: Prejudices are contagious, they tend to come in clusters so they act as a mental handicap.

JL: But why would somebody like her be prejudiced? Is she aware of what others have said about your book, the support it has gained?

PH: Certainly she is aware – I sent her three pages of review comments, generous praise from Angus Mitchell, Jim O’ Callaghan, Declan Kiberd, Conor Lenihan, the late Martin Mansergh, Brian Leahy and other legal experts, authors, academics. And her own predecessor as president, Michael D. Higgins.

JL: And her response?

PH: She ignores all of them; although she knows very little she believes she knows more than all of them. They all read the book but she refuses.

JL: Quite insulting, don’t you think, I mean to those people?

PH: It certainly is but by now her hostility to the book is beyond her control. She’s under the influence of a dominant prejudice which acts like a mental black hole.

JL: What do you think has happened? Can it be explained?

PH: It seems probable to me that someone has primed her about my book, has given her a version of how they interpret the book and this someone is also ignorant about the history and background. And like so many this person almost certainly believes the diaries are genuine. In short, Connolly has allowed herself to be manipulated.

JL: She could check for herself, couldn’t she?

PH: Yes, but she’s happy with the interpretation – it suits her prejudices.

JL: Do you think anything can change?

PH: Only if she somehow comes to her senses and realizes her position is indefensible and irrational. But I’d like to close on a light note, something surreal. Of all the desperate attempts to find evidence for the diaries’ authenticity, I think this one is outstanding. There are no witnesses, there are only the typescripts in 1916. But what I can offer you as evidence is a homosexual exclamation mark.

JL: Not with you.

PH: It’s in Reid’s 1976 study of over 500 pages – he was a US literary professor who discovered the sexual orientation of an exclamation mark supposedly written by Casement at the top of a letter. From page 486 I quote Reid; “I do not scruple to argue that that is a homosexual exclamation point.”

JL: You must be joking.

PH: Not convinced? Check the book.