As I was happily listening to the Croppy's Complaint throughout the summer I had close to hand two books, The Golden Sun of Irish Freedom - 1798 in Song and Story and The `98 Reader - An Anthology of Song, Prose and Poetry.

Both contain a selection of `98 ballads alongside a history of the period.

In some ways The ``98 Reader takes a fairly academic approach, including many original documents which are a fascinating insight into the unfolding events and aftermath of the Rebellion not found in the standard histories. A much appreciated chronology starting in 1778 with Henry Grattan's address to the English parliament on conditions in Ireland and ending with the surrender of Michael Dwyer in 1803 is provided and really helps those of us less schooled in what sometimes feels like a very fragmented history of the rebellion. Many stories collected from the oral tradition have also been included as well as notes on the songs, poems and their writers. This combination of source material and oral history gives very personal and sometimes very harrowing accounts of the events which are then cast into popular ballad or poem and illustrates the powerful response in Ireland to the bravery and tragedy that characterises 1798.

``The ballads may not always accurately state the what of history but they invariably tell you the why,'' says Terence Folan in the The Golden Sun of irish Freedom.

This book was originally intended to be a script for a commenoration of 1798 that the singer Danny Doyle could use during his concerts to mark the Bi-centenary. As such therefore it is accessible and easy to read. The foreword reads almost as a defence of the value of the ballads as a people's history. But to those familiar with the song tradition this defence is unnecessary. It would do the anti-Come-All-Ye camp no harm to open their minds to the arguments in this book. Here is a fine collection of songs, some familiar and some not, interwoven through the events of `98 presenting the view of the ordinary people as stated by the balladeer.

There is no pretence in this book of ``objectivity''. The writer stands squarely with the people of Ireland - sometimes a little too squarely even for me. But anyway, I think that strikes a balance against all the efforts to sanitise `98 that we've had to endure this last year. And another strong point in its favour is that it includes the music and guitar chords for every song.

We went to Kilalla in August and watched 600 Pikemen and women march from Humbert's Landing to Kilalla. Snippets of songs of the period ran through my head as we saw the pikes carried by people from Kerry, Wexford, Meath and Mayo. Like many other people, I'd learned these in my family and later from records and other singers. I remembered my mother telling me that she could trace her family back to the United Men in Ballinahinch and I was glad. I just wish there was a collection of songs about women who fought like Mary Doyle - The Heroine of Ross. But with a bit of luck that's in the making.

By Maire Nic Maoláin