21.6 x 13.8 cm. 283 pp.    1987
The third volume in the Chronicles of an Age of Darkness series

‘Lord Alagrace said you’d help.’

‘Any oracle can give you a reading,’ replied Yen Olass.

‘I told Alagrace an oracle couldn’t help me,’ said the Ondrask. ‘I told him I wasn’t interested in a reading. But he told me you’d do better than that. He told me you’d fix it.’

‘What?’ said Yen Olass. She was genuinely shocked, and it took a lot to shock her.

So begins Yen Olass’ involvement in the life-long feud of the warlords of the Collosnon Empire. She was to witness war, madness and wizardry, and would play a greater part in the events of her time than a mere oracle had any right to expect.

 

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Edited by James H. Murphy

21.6 x 13.8 cm    
ISBN: 978-0-86140-315-8

This book presents the reader with a selection of the writings of Peter Connolly (1927-87) who retired as Professor of English Language and Literature at St Patrick's College, Maynooth in 1985.

Divided thematically, the essays cover the major subjects that interested him: apart from Censorship, Literature (his areas of greatest expertise were in the modern novel and modern poetry) and Religion are represented by his essays `The Priest in Modern Irish Fiction', `W.B.Yeats: "the unchristened heart" ', `God in Modern Literature', `Tragedy', and `The Church in Ireland since Vatican II'.

The issue on which Peter Connolly's ideas have had the most influence has undoubtedly been that of censorship, and the role he played in the public debate on censoring books in Ireland. Many of the distinctions he drew then could still have a useful role to play in the renewed contemporary debate, even though its focus has shifted towards the visual media, notably television. Included here are his essays `Censorship', `The Moralists and the Obscene', and `Thoughts after Longford'.

This volume, edited by James H. Murphy, opens with a collection of memories and tributes from friends and colleagues, and ends with a selection of his book reviews.

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21.6 x 13.8 cm.    x, 230 pp.    1982    
  Irish Literary Studies series (ISSN 0140-895X) volume 9

The papers in this collection were, with one exception, given at the triennial conference of the International Association for the Study of Anglo-Irish Literature held in St. Patrick's College, Maynooth, Ireland, in 1979.

The theme of the conference was the place of literature in a changing Ireland, and to this end the speakers' papers covered various aspects of this important subject. The contributors to this volume are in the order they appear here. Declan Kiberd, Klaus Lubbers, Cathal Ó Háinle, Vivian Mercier, Suheil Bushrui, Stan Smith, D. E. S. Maxwell, Thomas Kilroy, Peter Denman, James O'Brien, and Patrick Rafroidi.

CONTENTS<br

Introduction. Peter Connolly<br

Acknowledgements<br

THE PERILS OF NOSTALGIA: A CRITIQUE OF THE REVIVAL.  Declan Kiberd<br

AUTHOR AND AUDIENCE IN THE EARLY NINETEENTH CENTURY.  Klaus Lubbers<br

TOWARDS THE REVIVAL. SOME TRANSLATIONS OF IRISH POETRY:  1789-1897.  Cathal G. Ó Háinle<br

VICTORIAN EVANGELICALISM AND THE ANGLO-IRISH LITERARY REVIVAL. Vivian Mercier<br

IMAGES OF A CHANGING IRELAND IN THE WORKS OF W.B.YEATS.  Suheil Badi Bushrui<br

HISTORIANS AND MAGICIANS: IRELAND BETWEEN FANTASY AND HISTORY. Stan Smith<br

SEMANTIC SCRUPLES: A RHETORIC FOR POLITICS IN THE NORTH. D.E.S.Maxwell<br

THE IRISH WRITER: SELF AND SOCIETY, 1950-1980.  Thomas Kilroy<br

RHYME IN MODERN ANGLO-IRISH POETRY.  Peter Denman<br

THREE IRISH WOMEN STORY WRITERS IN THE 1970s.  James O'Brien<br

CHANGE AND THE IRISH IMAGINATION.  Patrick Rafroidi<br

Notes on the Contributors<br

Index

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Chosen and Introduced by Mary Shine Thompson

The fourteenth volume of the Irish Drama Selections series (ISSN 0260-7962), General Editors: Joseph Ronsley and Ann Saddlemyer.

21.6 x 13.8 cm.

Contains: The Son of Learning, The Flame, Black Fast, The Kiss, As the Crow Flies, The Viscount of Blarney, The Second Kiss, Liberty Lane,and the hitherto unpublished The Frenzy of Sweeney and St Patrick’s Purgatory (a translation of Calderón’s play), ‘Verse Speaking’, ‘Verse Speaking and Verse Drama’, and a bibliographical checklist.

Austin Clarke (1896-1974) is known as a poet, a playwright, a broadcaster and a novelist. In the later part of his life his work became better known principally through the support given by Liam Miller and the Dolmen Press in publishing his Collected Plays (1963) and later single plays, and volumes of poems, culminating in his Collected Poems (1974). His work as a reviewer was ceaseless, and during his life he wrote over 1,500 reviews, assessing over 5,000 books, but it must be as one of twentieth century Ireland’s most important poets that he is best known.

Clarke’s plays are less well known, both perhaps because they are verse plays, and also because they have been out of print for so many years, so the publication of a selection was long overdue.

Mary Shine Thompson is a lecturer in the English Department of St Patrick's College Drumcondra (Dublin City University) and College Coordinator of Research. Her doctoral dissertation is entitled 'Austin Clarke; A Literary Life-Chronology'. She was commissioned to prepare the National Library of Ireland's Catalogue of its Austin Clarke holdings, completed in 2003. Among her publications are Studies in Children Literature 1500-2000  (Four Courts Press, 2004) and Treasure Islands, Real And Imagined, in Children's Literature (2005), both edited with C. Keenan.

Please note. Due to changes in sale patterns since the series was started we have not issued this work in paperback. ISBN 0-86140-209-X is cancelled.

 

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Edited by Gregory A. Schirmer

21.6 x 13.8 cm.      Irish Literary Studies series (ISSN 0140-895X)  volume 40

Austin Clarke is widely regarded as one of 20th-century Ireland's most important poets. In this selection of nearly fifty essays and reviews written over Clarke's long career, he demonstrates that he is an astute and provocative literary critic as well.

Having grown up in Dublin when the excitement of the Irish Literary Revival was still running high, Clarke knew many of the principal figures of that movement personally, and his readings of Yeats, Joyce, Synge, O'Casey, Lady Gregory, George Moore, and others, enjoy the advantages of an insider's point of view. Moreover, committed in his own poetry to the basic assumption that fuelled the Literary Revival – that the most productive course for Irish  literature lay in the direction not of England but of Ireland – Clarke in his criticism provides a way of understanding, and judging, the Revival's major writers in terms of their relationships to Ireland's rich literary and cultural traditions. At the same time, these essays call attention to a number of distinctly Irish, but often overlooked, writers working on the margins of the revival.

As Yeats observed more than once, the Irish, for all the contributions that they have made to modern fiction, poetry, and drama, have fallen somewhat short in the genre of literary criticism. Austin Clarke's essays and reviews, many of which were written under a pseudonym and so not attributed to Clarke for years, go a long way towards filling that gap.

A selection of Clarke's writings on Yeats is followed by one on other Irish writers and the Irish Literary Revival, and on Modern English and American literature. Included as an appendix is an exhaustive list of Clarke's literary criticism, mostly in periodicals, including over 400 anonymous reviews written for the Times Literary Supplement.

 
Gregory A.Schirmer is the author of The Poetry of Austin Clarke and William Trevor: A Study of His Fiction, and has written widely on a variety of other modern Irish writers. He is Professor of English at the University of Mississippi.

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21.6 x 13.8 cm     x, 277 pp.   1991      Irish Literary Studies series (ISSN 0140-895X) volume 34

Though men dominated early Irish society, women dominated the supernatural. Goddesses of war, fertility, and sovereignty ordered human destiny. Christian monks, in recording the old stories, turned these pagan deities into saints, like St Brigit, or into mortal queens like Medb of Connacht. The Morrigan, the Great Queen, war goddess, remains a figure of awe, but her pagan functions are glossed over. She perches, crow of battle, on the dying warrior CuChulainn’s pillar stone, but her role as his tutelary deity, and as planner and fomentor of the whole tremendous Tain, the war between Ulster and Connacht, is obscured. Unlike the Anglo-Irish authors who in modem times treated the same material in English, the good Irish monks were not shocked by her sexual aggressiveness. They show her coupling with the Dagda, the ‘good god’ of the Tuatha De Danann before the second battle of Mag Tuired, but they conceal that this act – by a goddess of war, fertility and sovereignty – gives the Dagda’s people victory and the possession of Ireland. Or they reduce the sovereignty to allegory – when Niall of the Nine Hostages sleeps with the Hag she is allegorical of the trials of kingship!

With the English invasion and colonisation, the power of the goddesses diminishes further. The Sovereignty has no kingship to bestow. In the aisling poets she becomes unattainable sexually, a vision of Irish independence. She no longer legitimises the king, but dreams of a Jacobite rescue. Yeats’s Cathleen ni Houlihan combines this inaccessible vision-woman with the hag, the Poor Old Woman. She offers only death for a dream, though she has the walk of a queen. The Great Queens juxtaposes early Irish texts – such as Tain Bo Reganina, Togail Bruidne Da Derga, and many others – with Anglo-Irish treatments of the same themes by Standish O’Grady, Lady Gregory, James Stephens, and W. B. Yeats. The book shows the fall in status of the pagan goddesses, first under medieval Christianity and then under Anglo-Irish culture. That this fall shows a loss in the recognition of the roles of women seems evident from the texts. This human loss only begins to be restored when, presiding over the severed heads in Yeats’s The Death of Cuchulain, the Morrigu declares, ‘I arranged the Dance.’

 

 

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23.3 x 15. 8 cm.    xxiv, 283 pp.    with over 50 illustrations

A critical work about one of the leading figures in modern poetry, this book shows how Yeats perfected great songs – “Crazy Jane on the Day of Judgment”, “Three Things”, “After Long Silence”, “Her Triumph” – and great choruses – “Colonus’ Praise”, “From ‘Œdipus at Colonus’” and “From the ‘Antigone’”. The author follows the manuscript development of each poem to discover its full context in life and culture, to illuminate obscurities in the finished text, or simply to witness in amazement the emergence of a true poem from a tangle of abstractions. As a result, the reader is given original and interesting interpretations of the songs and choruses as final works of art.

“When I prepared ‘Œdipus at Colonus’ . . . wrote Yeats, “I saw that the wood of the Furies . . . was any Irish haunted wood.” Clark shows that Yeats re­membered Greece when he wrote songs for Crazy Jane. Greek myth appears in the songs, and Greek choruses appear in the “Irish” song cycles. The last word in “A Man Young and Old” is spoken of Œdipus and the last word in “A Woman Young and Old” of Antigone. Classical figures rub elbows with Huddon and Duddon and Daniel O’Leary. In “Her Triumph” the woman sees herself and her lover as Perseus and Andromeda.

Paintings, often of mythological subjects, were part of the context for Yeats’s poems. Yeats was an art student and the son and brother of well-known painters. The manuscripts show exactly what paintings – by Bellini, Carpaccio, Titian – were in Yeats’s thought when he wrote “Her Triumph” and Clark concludes that one of Burne-Jones’s Perseus series was the chief model for the poem’s imagery. Other poems, too, were written in the context of Yeats’s knowledge of art. Relevant illus­trations are included. Manu­scripts too are photographically reproduced.

Among the many comments on Clark’s skill as an interpreter of Yeats are: “Clark varies his approach to fit the materials at hand: with one poem he will emphasize the visual sources, for example, whereas with another lyric he will concern himself with biographical matters . . . Clark’s scholarship is quite sound, and he is working at the frontiers of Yeats scholarship.” – Richard J. Finneran, editor, Anglo-Irish Literature, A Review of Research

“Clark’s intricate analysis of Yeats’s ‘After Long Silence’ is a jewel of scholarship, moving and illuminating: in his analysis of the poem, and of the manuscripts out of which it emerged, Clark seems to have moved for a moment into Yeats’s mind.” - Robert O’Driscoll, The University of Toronto Quarterly.

'A pleasure to read....a book for anyone interested in Yeats or the creative process, a real contribution to Yeats studies.' Books Ireland'A pleasure to read....a book for anyone interested in Yeats or the creative process, a real contribution to Yeats studies.' Books Ireland

Professor of English at the University of Massachusetts, Amherst, David Clark was the author of Lyric Resonance: Glosses on Some Poems by Yeats, Frost, Crane, Cummings and Others and of Dry Tree: Poems. He has also either edited or co­edited a number of works on modern literature and on Irish culture.

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Chosen, edited and introduced by Claudia Harris

ISBN: 978-0-86140-438-4

21.6 x 13.8 cm.  liv, 258pp. + 8pp. with 16  illus. hardback       November 2005

>

The Charabanc Theatre Company played a major role in Northern Ireland’s theatrical renaissance during the 1980s. Charabanc was formed by five out-of-work Belfast actresses (Marie Jones, Maureen Macauly, Eleanor Methven, Carol Moore, Brenda Winter) who first collected stories and then collaborated in writing and performing highly original plays for enthusiastic audiences. From 1983 to 1995, the company toured twenty-tour productions extensively throughout Ireland and the world, spreading their own particular brand of exuberant, dark humour.

The four plays in this collection – Now You’re Talking (1985), Gold in the Streets (1986), The Girls in the Big Picture (1986), and Somewhere Over the Balcony (1987) – represent the creative high point of the company. These entertaining plays show the broad range of the company’s work: portraits of urban and rural women; early, mid-, and late twentieth century settings, and various social, religious, historical political, or personal relations.

Marie Jones, Eleanor Methven, and Carol Moore were the remaining company principals during the mid-1980s when these four plays were created and performed. Marie Jones became the main writer for Charabanc and after leaving the company in 1990 has continued to write, notably the award-winning Stones in His Pockets. Eleanor Methven and Carol Moore continued on as artistic directors until they disbanded the company in 1995. Eleanor Methven now lives in Dublin and is a sought-after actress for stage and screen, and her first screenplay is in development with Journeyman Films. Carol Moore obtained an MA from Queen’s University, Belfast, and still acts for stage and film, but is now primarily an accomplished stage and screen director; in May 2005 she received a NESTA (National Endowment for Science Technology and the Arts) Fellowship.

 

 

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21.6 x 13.8 cm.    271 pp.    1978       Irish Literary Studies series (ISSN 0140-895X) volume 3

George Moore once complained, after warmly appreciative reviews of a novel, 'So few bother to analyse the book carefully. It would have been very easy to discuss the form, compare my treatment of it with others' treatment of similar themes and so on, yet apparently no one has ever thought of that.' This rueful remark was the starting point in Richard Cave's design of this study. He has examined each of Moore's novels in detail and viewed them within the pattern of his total development and in the context of Moore's current reading and ideas about technique, as well as assessing the value of a wide range of influences to him. Professor Cave's study is basically divided into three parts: 'The Novel of Social Realism', which deals with A Modern Lover, A Mummer's Wife, A Drama in Muslin and Esther Waters;  'A Phase of Experiment' deals with new influences and the resultant problems, the four novellas, Wagner's influence, Evelyn Innes and Sister Teresa; and 'Styles for Consciousness' – The Lake, The Brook Kerith and the late historical novels, followed by a conclusion.

Author's Note<br

Introduction
<br

Part One: THE NOVEL OF SOCIAL REALISM<br

1. A Modern Lover<br

2. A Mummer's Wife<br

3. A Drama in Muslin<br

4. Esther Waters

Part Two: A PHASE OF EXPERIMENT<br

5. New Influences – New Problems<br

6. Four Novellas<br

7. Wagner and the Novel<br

8. Evelyn Innes and Sister Teresa

Part Three: STYLES FOR CONSCIOUSNESS<br

9. The Lake – The Wagnerian Novel Perfected<br

10. The Brook Kerith and the Late Historical Novels<br

Conclusion

Notes

Index

Richard Allen Cave, Emeritus Professor of Drama and Theatre Arts at Royal Holloway in the University of London, has published extensively in the fields of renaissance drama (Jonson, Webster, Brome), modern English and Irish theatre (Wilde, Yeats, Pinter, Beckett, Friel, Mc Guinness), dance (Ninette de Valois, Robert Helpmann), stage design (Charles Ricketts, Robert Gregory) and direction (Terence Gray). Most recently, he devised and was General Editor of an AHRC-funded project to create an online edition of The Collected Plays of Richard Brome (2010), and published the monograph, Collaborations: Ninette de Valois and William Butler Yeats (2011). The Collected Brome is soon to be published in a more traditional book-format by Oxford University Press (2020). He has also edited the plays of Wilde, Yeats and T.C. Murray; and the manuscript versions of Yeats’s The King of the Great Clock Tower and A Full Moon in March. Professor Cave is a trained Feldenkrais practitioner who works on vocal techniques with professional actors and on extending movement skills with performers in physical theatre.

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21.6 x 13.8 cm  

This symposium was first delivered as a series of lectures in Rome arranged under the auspices of the Keats-Shelley Memorial Association and the British Council. The aim was very much to interpret the drama created by the English Romantic poets from the perspective of the modern theatrical tradition.

The four essays included here investigate the relationship between the Romantics and the theatre of their own time, assess the considerable body of dramatic works com­posed by Byron and Shelley, and explore the history of plays by Wordsworth, Coleridge, Shelley and Byron in performance on the British stage.

All argue that, though the Romantic poets were out of sympathy with the theatre of their day, they wrote forms of drama that to a considerable degree anticipate the theatre of the present century.

As Sir Joseph Cheyne states in his Foreword to this volume: ‘No one realised, when the symposium was planned, what a remarkable impact it would have. The accepted idea of the Romantic theatre was still one of lyric drama, difficult to produce and perform. To hear it described suddenly as modern, psychological drama, as the theatre of the mind, the “theatre of violence”, was so striking that the ripples are still washing the shore’.

This symposium comprises ‘The Romantic Poet and the Stage: A Short, Sad History’ (Professor Timothy Webb), ‘The Dramas of Byron’ (Professor Giorgio Melchiori), ‘The Shelleyan Drama’ (Professor Stuart Curran), ‘Romantic Drama in Performance’ (Dr. Richard Allen Cave), and a select biblio­graphy on the Romantic Drama (Christina Gee and Judith Knight).

Richard Allen Cave, Emeritus Professor of Drama and Theatre Arts at Royal Holloway in the University of London, has published extensively in the fields of renaissance drama (Jonson, Webster, Brome), modern English and Irish theatre (Wilde, Yeats, Pinter, Beckett, Friel, Mc Guinness), dance (Ninette de Valois, Robert Helpmann), stage design (Charles Ricketts, Robert Gregory) and direction (Terence Gray). Most recently, he devised and was General Editor of an AHRC-funded project to create an online edition of The Collected Plays of Richard Brome (2010), and published the monograph, Collaborations: Ninette de Valois and William Butler Yeats (2011). The Collected Brome is soon to be published in a more traditional book-format by Oxford University Press (2020). He has also edited the plays of Wilde, Yeats and T.C. Murray; and the manuscript versions of Yeats’s The King of the Great Clock Tower and A Full Moon in March. Professor Cave is a trained Feldenkrais practitioner who works on vocal techniques with professional actors and on extending movement skills with performers in physical theatre.

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ISBN: 978-0-86140-321-9
21.6 x 13.8 cm         revised edition of the 1988 hbk

The works of established dramatists and of new talents are examined from the stand-point of the original production and initial casts, the major dramatists studied being Alan Ayckbourn, Samuel Beckett, Edward Bond, Trevor Griffiths, David Hare, Harold Pinter, Tom Stoppard, and David Storey. A central theme of the book is the current relationship between the author and the actor.

CONTENTS
Harold Pinter
New Forms of Comedy: Ayckbourn and Stoppard
Monologues and Soliloquies: Samuel Beckett
Poetic Naturalism: David Storey
Political Drama and David Hare
Trevor Griffiths
The History Play: Edward Bond

'As drama in performance is now, rightly, given such prominence in the study of playwrights and plays there is obvious need for an intelligent and sensitive book which looks at recent drama in the context of the stage. This is exactly what Richard Cave presents in his latest work. . . . this is a book which future historians will be grateful for, and which ordinary readers can dip into for the pleasure of reliving, or vicariously experiencing for the first time, the peculiar excitement of seeing new plays that constitute a new theatrical event.'  R.P.Draper in Times Higher Education Supplement

Richard Allen Cave, Emeritus Professor of Drama and Theatre Arts at Royal Holloway in the University of London, has published extensively in the fields of renaissance drama (Jonson, Webster, Brome), modern English and Irish theatre (Wilde, Yeats, Pinter, Beckett, Friel, Mc Guinness), dance (Ninette de Valois, Robert Helpmann), stage design (Charles Ricketts, Robert Gregory) and direction (Terence Gray). Most recently, he devised and was General Editor of an AHRC-funded project to create an online edition of The Collected Plays of Richard Brome (2010), and published the monograph, Collaborations: Ninette de Valois and William Butler Yeats (2011). The Collected Brome is soon to be published in a more traditional book-format by Oxford University Press (2020). He has also edited the plays of Wilde, Yeats and T.C. Murray; and the manuscript versions of Yeats’s The King of the Great Clock Tower and A Full Moon in March. Professor Cave is a trained Feldenkrais practitioner who works on vocal techniques with professional actors and on extending movement skills with performers in physical theatre.

 

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with The Irish Bardic Poet

ISBN: 978-0-85105-360-8

19.8 x 12.9 cm.

In Medieval Irish Lyrics Professor Carney gives us text and translation of early Irish Poems, both secular and religious. The translations are sensitive and felicitous, the fruit of some thirty years of research in Irish language and literature. Several of the poems have hitherto been known only to a handful of scholars and some appeared for the first time in this book.

Readers of all kinds will find here an introduction to the poetry of Ireland in verse translations which catch the movement of spirit of the originals. Professor Carney has prefaced the whole with an introduction in which he places the medieval Irish lyrics in their social and historical context.

The poets represented here wrote for a society which employed professional poets who could claim to stand in a direct succession from the druidic order of pre-Christian times. This new edition includes The Irish Bardic Poet, Professor Carney’s noted lecture to the Celtic School of the Dublin Institute of Advanced Studies (1958) in which he presents a comprehensive picture of the relationship between a Bardic poet, Eochaidh Ó hEoghusa and his patrons, the Maguire family of Fermanagh.

James Carney of the Dublin Institute for Advanced Studies, is the author of Studies in Early Irish Literature and History, The Problem of St. Patrick and The Poems of Blathmac.

'These translations of Professor Carney’s, from the point of view of a telling economy and a regard for the original image, its absolute rightness, are far and away superior to anything else I have read.' The Cork Examiner)

' Professor Carney has thrown light where there were shadows before, and for this he is, as scholar and poet, due our gratitude.' The Dublin Magazine)

 

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21.6 x 13.8 cm.     with all the original illustrative etchings

 Traits and Stories of the Irish Peasantry can be considered to be Carleton’s greatest work. It went through a number of transformations before the ‘definitive edition’ was published in 1842-44. This edition was the last that Carleton actually oversaw; thus it is the culmination of his own work on the collection, and for this reason is the edition we publish.

Traits and Stories contains a wealth of illustrations by famous illustra­tors of the time. They give a good impression of the tales themselves, being crowded with laughing, weeping, fighting, working, playing, dying, and praying peasants in sublime scenery, poverty-stricken cot­tages, cosy public houses, trim farms, broken-down barns, hillside chapels, hedge schools, and hovels. The inhabitants of Carleton’s world are villains, scholars, horse-thieves, pig-drivers, priests, farmers and shopkeepers. He aimed to show the Irish peasant honestly to the world, choosing simple, strong plots. Contemporary critics praised Carleton most for the ‘light and shade’ of his depictions of Irish charac­ter, and much of his power lies in the combination and contracts of light and shade, good and evil, fun and tragedy. He is a writer of great comic genius, as well as being able to convey the horrors of poverty and the peasant life.

He conveys, too, a sense of urgency. What he was describing was an Ireland of his youth that was passing or had already passed, hence his often lengthy annotations about the traditions, tales, customs and pas­times that he even then considered necessary for his readership.

A fine ability to tell a story distinguishes Carleton from many contem­porary purveyors of folklore and folk life, and this contributed to his immense popularity in Ireland, England and across the Atlantic in the United States and Canada. There appeared over 50 editions of Traits and Stories, containing some or all the stories of the ‘Definitive Edition’, in the 19th Century alone. No other work of the first half of the 19th Century conveys so well the rural life of the period. Apart from being immensely entertaining, these stories are essential reading for the literary and history student of that period. This is the only com­plete printing of the ‘Definitive Edition’ presently available.

Volume 2 contains 'Geography of an Irish Oath' – 'The Lianhan Shee' – 'Going to Maynooth' – 'Phelim O'Toole's Courtship' – 'The Poor Scholar' – 'Wildgoose Lodge' – 'Tubber Derg'; or 'The Red Well' – 'Neal Malone'

 

Barbara Hayley died in a road accident at the time she was Professor of English at St Patrick’s College, Maynooth. Her publications include Carleton’s Traits and Stories and the 19th Century Anglo-Irish Tradition (1983), and A Bibliography of the Writings of William Carleton (1985). Her Carleton’s Alterations to ‘Traits & Stories of the Irish Peasantry’ is not yet published.

 

 

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With an Introduction by Barbara Hayley

21.6 x 13.8 cm.     with all the original illustrative etchings

Traits and Stories of the Irish Peasantry can be considered to be Carleton’s greatest work. It went through a number of transformations before the ‘definitive edition’ was published in 1842-44. This edition was the last that Carleton actually oversaw; thus it is the culmination of his own work on the collection, and for this reason is the edition we publish.

Traits and Stories contains a wealth of illustrations by famous illustra­tors of the time. They give a good impression of the tales themselves, being crowded with laughing, weeping, fighting, working, playing, dying, and praying peasants in sublime scenery, poverty-stricken cot­tages, cosy public houses, trim farms, broken-down barns, hillside chapels, hedge schools, and hovels. The inhabitants of Carleton’s world are villains, scholars, horse-thieves, pig-drivers, priests, farmers and shopkeepers. He aimed to show the Irish peasant honestly to the world, choosing simple, strong plots. Contemporary critics praised Carleton most for the ‘light and shade’ of his depictions of Irish charac­ter, and much of his power lies in the combination and contracts of light and shade, good and evil, fun and tragedy. He is a writer of great comic genius, as well as being able to convey the horrors of poverty and the peasant life.

He conveys, too, a sense of urgency. What he was describing was an Ireland of his youth that was passing or had already passed, hence his often lengthy annotations about the traditions, tales, customs and pas­times that he even then considered necessary for his readership.

A fine ability to tell a story distinguishes Carleton from many contem­porary purveyors of folklore and folk life, and this contributed to his immense popularity in Ireland, England and across the Atlantic in the United States and Canada. There appeared over 50 editions of Traits and Stories, containing some or all the stories of the ‘Definitive Edition’, in the 19th Century alone. No other work of the first half of the 19th Century conveys so well the rural life of the period. Apart from being immensely entertaining, these stories are essential reading for the literary and history student of that period. This is the only com­plete printing of the ‘Definitive Edition’ presently available.

Volume 1 contains Professor Hayley’s foreword Carleton’s Auto-biographical Introduction – 'Ned M'Keown' – 'The Three Tasks' – 'Shane Fadh's Wedding – 'Larry M'Farland's Wake' – 'The Battle of the Factions' – 'The Station' – 'The Party Fight and Funeral' – 'The Lough Derg Pilgrim' – 'The Hedge School' – 'The Midnight Mass' – 'The Donagh', or 'The Horse-stealers' – 'Phil Purcel the Pig-Driver'.

Barbara Hayley died in a road accident at the time she was Professor of English at St Patrick’s College, Maynooth. Her publications include Carleton’s Traits and Stories and the 19th Century Anglo-Irish Tradition (1983), and A Bibliography of the Writings of William Carleton (1985). Her Carleton’s Alterations to ‘Traits & Stories of the Irish Peasantry’ is not yet published.

 

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Edited and Revised by Peter Bander van Duren

ISBN: 978-0-905715-26-1

23.4 x 15.6 cm.    336 pp.  illus with 24pp  colour illus and many b/w throughout the text

What follows is from the jacket of the third edition (published 25 October 1985). Although superseded by Peter Bander van Duren's magisterial work of a similar name, Orders of Knighthood and of Merit (1995), we still have copies of every edition of Archbishop Cardinale's work for sale. Details of the earlier editions can be found at the bottom of this page.

This authoritative work deals not only with the role of the Holy See in conferring Orders of Knighthood and awards but also with the Holy See's attitude to State, Crown and Dynastic Orders of Knighthood. Its relationship to most ancient Orders goes far deeper than mutual recognition: they were founded by Papal Brief and at the Holy See's initiative.

This work goes beyond the scope of an authoritative, historical, juridical and practical compendium: it shows clearly the Holy See's role as mater et magistra of all ancient Orders of Knighthood. The author strikes a most serious note when he clarifies the Holy See's uncompromising attitude towards self-styled orders of knighthood; for obvious reasons the attitude adopted by the Holy See towards individual orders usually makes the difference between international recognition and rejection.

The five Pontifical Orders of Knighthood, the Orders o Christ, of the Golden Spur, of Pius IX, of St Gregory the Great, and of Pope St Sylvester, the Sovereign Military Order of Malta, the Equestrian Order of the Holy Sepulchre (which is under the patronage of the Holy See), as well as the Teutonic Order, a former Religious Order of Knighthood which is no longer an order of chivalry, are dealt with in depth. The three Pontifical Awards, the Golden Rose, the Cross Pro Ecclesia et Pontifice, and especially the Medal Benemerenti (with the special medals struck as Benemerenti Medals which were awarded for a specific purpose or for a limited time only), have been placed in their rightful positions among international decorations of merit. An extensive section deals with the Pontifical Medal, which is often given by the Pontiff as a sign of his special favour.

The most important Catholic dynastic orders, such as the Noble Order of the Golden Fleece (of both Austria and Spain, and particularly the new rules of conferment of the Spanish Order), the Sacred and Military Constantinian Order of St George (it and the Most Noble Order of the Garter being the most ancient and important Orders of Knighthood under the patronage of St George, the Orders of the Annunziata, SS. Maurice & Lazarus, St Januarius, as well as the less exalted Catholic Orders that are still flourishing, are seen united behind the Supreme Pontiff and the Holy See. All Catholic-founded Orders, both those that have remained Catholic in character and those that became Crown or secular State Orders, were founded by Papal Brief; even behind the Iron Curtain there exists in Poland a Catholic-founded Order which, although suppressed in its country of origin, because of international law flourishes outside Poland, and the Grand Master, a President-in-exile, assumed responsibilities that are recognised by the international community. True chivalry transcends politics, ideologies and -isms.

The extensive lists of extinct Catholic Orders are of particular interest to layman and scholar alike, as they have been used for the setting-up of legions of self-styled and fantasy orders over the years.

[from the second edition: On 24 March 1983 the author died in Brussels. Before entering hospital early in February for an operation from which he never regained full consciousness, he asked his friend and collaborator, Peter Bander van Duren to ensure publication of the book on 25 March 1983, to coincide with the inauguration of the Holy Year.]

After the tragic death of His Excellency Archbishop Cardinale, on the day before publication of the first edition of this work, it became obviously that much work and revision remained to be done. Peter Bander van Duren was asked to become the Reviser and Editor of this work, which clearly and unambiguously expresses the Holy See's attitude to, and views on, the Orders of Knighthood. Sovereigns, Grand Masters, and Chancellors of all the principal Orders in the world that come within the sphere of the Holy See's magistral and maternal influence have given their wholehearted cooperation. The result is the most authoritative work ever written on the subject, prologued and endorsed by His Eminence the Papal Secretary of State, Agostino Cardinal Casaroli, and graciously approved by the Supreme Pontiff, qui sub Deo Fons est Honorum.

Earlier editions of Orders of Knighthood, Awards and the Holy See.

These are not officially in print, but as there are a few copies left anyone interested in purchasing a copy of either edition should get in touch with Colin Smythe Limited. There were considerable changes in the second and third editions, not only to the text, but in the illustrations, which makes them all of interest to the collector.
1^st edition, published 25 March 1983
ISBN 0-905715-21-7  332pp.+ 20pp. in colour    £35.00
[This edition is inaccurately listed in the book as having 0-905715-12-8 as its ISBN (International Standard Book Number), but this number had already been allocated to the limited edition of Archbishop Heim's Heraldry in the Catholic Church, and therefore had to be changed.]

2^nd edition, published September 1984
edited and revised by Peter Bander van Duren
ISBN 0-905715-23-3  334pp + 20pp. in colour £35.00

 

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With a foreword by Edmund Blunden

21.5 x 13.8 cm.     143 pp.   1982
ISBN: 978-0-86140-122-2

During his life John Cairncross was considered to be the best trans­lator of Racine’s works, both from his ability to convey the ‘feel’ of the original as well as through the accuracy of his translation. One critic has said that Mr. Cairncross’s translations are ‘the only ones that arc both compulsively readable and capture the style as fairly as our language permits’, praise echoed by others, including the New Statesman and Times Literary Supplement.

In this collection from the French, Italian, Span­ish, German and Chinese, Mr. Cairncross demon­strates his ability with great skill. In La Fontaine’s Fables, as in the other translations in this volume, he captures the mood in every case. Each poem appears in the original language as well as in English, and, ending with a number of John Cairncross’s own poems, this book is a true pleasure to read.

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ISBN: 978-0-86140-193-2

21.6 x 13.8 cm   255 pp.  1989

W.B.Yeats is one of the most important and widely-read poets of the twentieth century, occupying a central position in literature courses throughout the world. Yet he is often presented in critical works as a ‘difficult’ poet who can only be understood by reference to other writings that must be used as keys to unlock the mysteries of his work. It is the belief of the authors of this book that the poetry must be approached on its own terms, and its meanings established in as simple a way as possible before these texts can be enriched by knowledge of the biographical, historical, philosophical or aesthetic contexts.

This book is an essential companion to the poetry of Yeats for students in every country where his work is known. It sets out to meet the demands both of those whose first language is English, and of those for whom it is their second. Consequently the core of this volume is a detailed study of some ninety poems which cover all phases of Yeats’s poetic development. Each poem is provided with a summary, glossary and commentary, based on the primary meaning. The poems are also set in both the immediate context of the collections in which they were first published, and the wider context of the evolution of Yeats’s art and philosophy.

The Companion has a general commentary section dealing with Yeats’s style, his symbolism, his vision, the people and places that appear in his works, and the role of magic, myth, legend, history, civilization, nationalism and politics in the poems. There is also a useful list of recommended works, and basic texts.

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21.6 x 13.8 cm. xiv, 301 pp. 1982 Irish Literary Studies series (ISSN 0140-895X) volume 10

Published to mark the centenary of Joyce's birth, this collection has a foreword by Richard Ellmann, a message from Samuel Beckett, and essays by Bernard Benstock, Paul & Sylvia Botheroyd, Terence Brown, Suheil Bushrui, Paul van Caspel, Dominic Daniel, Phillip Herring, Declan Kiberd, Augustine Martin, Vivian Mercier, David Norris, John Paul Riquelme, Charles Rossmann, Ann Saddlemyer, Thomas F.Staley and Francis Warner, as well as poems by Suzanne Brown, Suheil Bushrui, John Montague and Gearóid Ó Clérigh, and a chronology. It covers every aspect of Joyce's work, with essays on each of the major works, on his poetry, and studies on various aspects of his life, the influence of Rimbaud, Joyce's connections with the Irish Dramatic Movement, and Joyce in Dublin, as well as essays on Joyce scholarship up to the date of publication.

'All in all, a rewarding compilation, rarely arid, and frequently vivacious.' Sunday Tribune

'an excellent book, one of the most provocative and rewarding in the current centenary-year cornucopia.' Books Ireland'

CONTENTS<br

A Message from Samuel Beckett<br

In Memoriam Sir Desmond Cochrane 1918-1979<br

Foreword: JOYCE AFTER A HUNDRED YEARS. Richard Ellmann<br

Acknowledgements<br

Introduction. Suheil Badi Bushrui and Bernard Benstock<br

JAMES JOYCE - NÓ SÉAMAS SEOIGHE. Gearóid Ó Clérigh<br

DUBLIN OF DUBLINERS. Terence Brown<br

THE READER'S ROLE IN A PORTRAIT OF THE ARTIST AS A YOUNG MAN. Charles Rossman<br

EXILES: A MORAL STATEMENT. Dominic Daniel<br

ON THE NATURE OF EVIDENCE IN ULYSSES. Bernard Benstock<br

JOHN EGLINTON AS SOCRATES: A STUDY OF `SCYLLA AND CHARYBDIS'. Vivian Mercier<br

TWISTS OF THE TELLER'S TALE: FINNEGANS WAKE. John Paul Riquelme<br

THE POETRY OF JAMES JOYCE. FRANCIS WARNER<br

JAMES JOYCE. John Montague<br

A TURNIP FOR THE BOOKS: JAMES JOYCE, A CENTENARY TRIBUTE. David Norris<br

SIN AND SECRECY IN JOYCE'S FICTION. Augustine Martin<br

THE VULGARITY OF HEROICS: JOYCE'S ULYSSES. Declan Kiberd<br

NIGHT FOX: FOR JAMES JOYCE. Suzanne Brown<br

JOYCE AND RIMBAUD. AN INTRODUCTORY ESSAY. Phillip Herring<br

JAMES JOYCE AND THE IRISH DRAMATIC MOVEMENT. Ann Saddlemyer<br

THE WANDERS: FOR JAMES JOYCE. Suheil Bushrui<br

JOYCE STUDIES IN THE NETHERLANDS. Paul van Caspel<br

JOYCE IN GERMANY AND SWITZERLAND. Paul and Sylvia Botheroyd<br

JOYCE IN THE ARAB WORLD. Suheil Bushrui<br

FOLLOWING ARIADNE'S STRING: TRACING JOYCE SCHOLARSHIP<br

INTO THE EIGHTIES. Thomas F.Staley<br
CHRONOLOGY. Suheil Bushrui<br

Notes on Contributors<br

Index

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'Sunshine & the Moon's Delight'
ISBN: 978-0-900675-78-8

21.0 x 13.8 cm.      356 pp.      1979

A paperback edition of the out-of-print hardback Sunshine & the Moon's Delight

The essays in this book (first published in 1972) demonstrate the universal appeal of J. M. Synge’s writings and his influence in the world. Collected and published in commemoration of the centenary of his birth, the volume originates from the oldest ‘modern’ university in the Arab world, and the contributions come from many countries, including Canada, France, Germany, Great Britain, Ireland, Japan, Jordan, Syria and the United States.

The collection consists of essays dealing with specific works (drama, poetry and prose) as well as with general studies of Synge as man and artist.

The book brings together in one volume some of the different kinds of work being carried out in the field of Synge studies.

It has not only proved of value to scholars, but is also a most useful reference work for students at schools and universities. It is edited by Suheil Badi Bushrui, who was born in Jordan,and was at that time Chairman of the Department of English at the American University of Beirut and a Ph.D. of Southampton University (England), where he was a British Council Scholar. He taught at the University of Ibadan (Nigeria), Calgary and York (Canada), and lectured at African, American, English and continental universities. In 1963 he was awarded the Una Ellis-Fermor Prize for his work on W. B. Yeats, on whom he has published four books; Yeats’s Verse Plays; The Revisions, 1900-1910 (1965); W. B. Yeats; Centenary Essays (1965); Shi'un Min Yeats (1969), the first book in Arabic on Yeats; and Images and Memories; A Pictorial Record of the life and works of W. B. Yeats (1970).

He has also written on English, Arabic and African literatures as well as on Anglo-Irish literature, his main interest. He organised the Gibran International Festival in Beirut (1970), and edited An Introduction to Kahlil Gibran (1970) and several other works on Gibran and Ameen Rhiani.  He was President of the Association of University Teachers of English in the Arab World. He died on 10 September 2015. Obituaries can be found at http://ysnews.com/news/2015/09/suheil-badi-bushrui and at http://www.baltimoresun.com/news/obituaries/bs-md-ob-suheil-bushrui-20150927-story.html, https://arabhyphen.wordpress.com/2015/09/10/suheil-badi-bushrui-passes-away-1929-2015/  and elsewhere.

 

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ISBN: 978-0-86140-279-3
21.6 x 13.8 cm.

Kahlil Gibran of Lebanon is a guide for all those interested in the life and work of Kahlil Gibran who want further information, be they general readers or scholars.

It explains the fascinating world of the author of The Prophet which is one of the most celebrated works of the twentieth century. Modelled on Gibran’s own writings, simple and concise in presentation, the first half of this work is devoted to significant events in Gibran’s life. It provides the reader with the necessary back ground to his writing and painting, with particular reference to the individuals and and works that have been major influences. These are further explored in the second half, which is a critical study of Gibran’s work and contribution to the literature of the world.

Suheil died in September 2015. Obituaries can be found at http://ysnews.com/news/2015/09/suheil-badi-bushrui and at http://www.baltimoresun.com/news/obituaries/bs-md-ob-suheil-bushrui-20150927-story.html, https://arabhyphen.wordpress.com/2015/09/10/suheil-badi-bushrui-passes-away-1929-2015/  and elsewhere.

CONTENTS
Introduction
PART 1, HIS LIFE:  Family background and early years - Kahlil Gibran and Mary Haskell - Early career in Boston, Paris and New York - Maturity - Last years.

PART 2, HIS WORK: Early Arabic writings - Influences and parallels in the mature works - Mature works up to The Prophet - The Prophet ­- Last works.
Notes.
Bibliography

 

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