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Volume 2, Issue 6
Trinity
Author: Leon Uris
Almost three decades ago, when author Leon Uris wrote the book Trinity, Ireland's "troubles" had yet to become the carbuncle on the English speaking world's arse that they were to become.
Uris was then a writer of historical fiction who labored, albeit successfully, in the shadow of the prolific James Michener, the 20th century's Stephen King of historical novels.
When Uris undertook to craft a tale of the history of the English domination of Ireland he enlisted his wife to help with the research, and she and he became shade-tree experts on the subject. At its publication Trinity initially met with huge commercial success but received only lukewarm critical reviews in the United States and in Ireland.
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Volume 2, Issue 5
Foreign Affairs and Other Stories
Sean O'Faolain
Atlantic, Little, Brown
All too often the voice of Irish Literature in the American mind is somehow stalled in pre-WWII works by the ancients or notables from the past century, such as Joyce. This may have something to do with the decline in recreational reading of substantive works by Americans in favor of waiting for the movie to go video.
At the same time, one wonders where the Irish authors are who are making a world mark today, and why we are not being presented with them through a marketing program of national impact. There may be no satisfactory answers to those questions, but we do know that Irish writing has plenty of modern voices representing the past 50 years. You just have to go look for them. Here's a place to start looking.
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Volume 2, Issue 5
The Story of Irish Dance
Helen Brennan
Brandon
Ireland is as diverse in cultural regions as the largest of nations. The notion of Ireland united on any given subject, especially on dance, is as far fetched as that of English sovereignty.
Helen Brennan is, no doubt, very knowledgeable about Irish dance. Her authoritative style and well-researched documentation is meticulous meeting the highest standards of the academic world. It is accurate in conveying the steps and dances but vague and incomplete in describing Irish dance's metamorphosis into its modern form. Dwelling in the past is nostalgic and necessary but laborious to understand. The Store of Irish Dance reads like a thesis full of facts and logical conclusions. Brennan substantiates here findings with evidence from interesting personal journals, collections, pamphlets and a sprinkling of rare publications on the subject of dance. The bibliography is a jewel of a resource for education in the history of dance.
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Volume 2, Issue 4
Dubliners
James Joyce
Assorted Publishers
Despite the body of Joyce's epic work, Dubliners best illustrates the time and station of Joyce's upbringing and influences - the Irish middle class at the outset of the 20th century.
Joyce himself described this collection of remarkable stories as chapters from his community and the arrangement of the 15 stories demonstrate progression from childhood to maturity with glimpses into private and public life.
From the opening story, Sisters, in which a boy learns about death and the attitudes of the living toward it from listening to conversations to Ivy Day In The Committee Room in which small political operatives revel in memories of the late, great leader to The Dead, a bittersweet tale of a Christmas party in Irish society and the dance song that reveals a woman's lost love to her husband, Dubliners not only charms and entrances but provides Irish-Americans with touchstones for their own familial experiences.
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Volume 2, Issue 3
Kwai Dan
Lafacadio Hearn
In the middle of the 19th century a small boy of Irish and Mediterranean descent, Lafacadio Hearn, was sent by an aunt to schools in Dublin and England to get a classical education. Those beginnings of an education made him one of America's greatest writers of that century, but one who wrote his most enduring work, Kwai Dan, as a resident of Japan.
The tiny boy was never to grow to more than five feet, three inches and suffered all his life from near blindness due to malformed eyes, one of which was clouded and sunk into his head and the other protruding like that of an octopus.
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Volume 2, Issue 3
The Druid Stone
Nancy Monaghan
The Druid Stone - Celtic Mysteries by Nancy Monaghan presents two adventurous mysteries for young readers. Filled with Celtic Druid lore and ancient legend, the author's exhaustive historical research brings the lush scenery and cultural heritage of Ireland and Scotland alive, painting beautiful images in the reader's mind.
In the first story, "The Spirit Stone - A Tale of Ireland," teenager Kelly Monaghan visits family in County Donegal, Ireland. Kelly has been having a recurring nightmare which turns out to be prophetic. She must free the spirit of one of her ancestors from the curse of an evil Druid in an exciting adventure.
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Volume 2, Issue 2
Irish Fairy Tales
Edited by Joseph Jacobs Castle
Irish Fairy Tales was suspect from its cover inasmuch as the publisher and editor chose to present the word "fairy" in its modern form but being applied to some of Ireland's most ancient and cherished tales. At the same time, the dust jacket's artwork of Celtic sea monsters and furies was so elegant and accurate that it was clear the volume was an understated project representing meticulous research in language and art.
From the more familiar tales such as The Story of Deirdre and The Lad With the Goatskin to more obscure sagas such as Conal Yellowclaw and The Horned Women, this book provides a look at the folklore and stories that shaped much of Ireland's view of the world in earlier centuries, shards of which remain in place in modern, rural Ireland. The editor has done well in retaining the music of the language and ensuring that the stories and their characters are clear despite some of the archaic verbiage, complexity and repetitiveness of parts of the tales. But let the language speak for itself.
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Volume 2, Issue 1
A Monk Swimming
Malachy McCourt Hyperion
The US is once again beguiled by Frank McCourt's adroit storytelling in "Tis," his follow-up to the black, but often sweet, "Angela's Ashes."
And while no one would dare to deflect the well deserved spotlight from Frank's work, another member of the McCourt clan - Malachy - penned a vivid, raw and hilarious memoir in 1998, "A Monk Swimming," that is no less powerful a depiction of his years in New York than his brother's books.
Malachy McCourt arrived in Manhattan in 1952. A larger-than-life man ..., he quickly became a celebrity bartender gin slinging to the stars, socialites and league of characters that make up Gotham's heart, mind and underbelly.
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Hornpipe Magazine
Irish Dance, Music, Film, and Culture
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