Saoirse Ronan reads Shorn for Spoken Stories Independence Updated / Tuesday, 2 Feb 2021 14:21 Spoken Stories Independence collection on RTÉ Radio 1, now available as a podcast here. Before writing her story, Rainsford asked herself ‘what does independence mean explicitly for women, especially in relation to war and violence and the roles their bodies play, that are often obscured after the facts. Shorn is a story about forced hair cutting, a rampant practice that was carried out by both sides during the (Irish) Civil War.’ Sue Rainsford All the writers contributing to the series consider independence today, a hundred years after Ireland’s War of Independence. The resulting collection is as varied as the writers themselves, as the stories are set across different times, locations and circumstances.