‘Deep inside that reporter there is a shaman speaking in tongues about surpluses to be distributed’

Radio reviews

Count staff open the ballot boxes in Simmonscourt RDS. Photo: Sam Boal/Collins

Declan Lynch

Be kind, they say, for everyone you meet is fighting a battle you know nothing about. At election time, for example, we discover that a disturbingly high number of people are utterly obsessed with the system of proportional representation and what it brings to their lives.

At all other times, we are inclined to regard them as normal people, not unlike ourselves, with a range of everyday interests – how wrong we are.