A celebration of the tenacious life of the enduring Irish classics, this book by one of Irish writing's most eloquent readers offers a brilliant and accessible

The stories collected here demonstrates the richness of the short story tradition in Ireland from the end of the last century to the period following the Second

'Can we not build up a national tradition, a national literature, which shall be none the less Irish in spirit from being English in language?' W. B. YeatsThis

First written down in the eighth century AD, these early Irish stories depict a far older world - part myth, part legend and part history. Rich with magic and a

'...from time to time a study comes along that truly can be called ‘path breaking,’ ‘seminal,’ ‘essential,’ a ‘must read.’ How the Irish Became