A review of 'This Great Calamity: The Irish Famine 1845-52" by Christine Kenealy. But was it really a 'calamity' as in 'Calamity Jane' or 'Calamity Paddy', an accident, a freak occurance? Should we continue to believe such fairy tales at all? Can we really understand Irish social and cultural life at all when historians cling to quasilegal colonialist jargon like 'outrage', 'riot' or 'disturbance'. It is not really an outrage at all when a starving person needs food. It is an outrage to call it an outrage. Nevertheless there is interest in the staple, 'potatoe', called the 'lazy crop' often.