John McGahern's significance to contemporary Irish literature was stated by Belfast novelist Glenn Patterson. When asked whether McGahern was his father, Patterson replied: "Yes. He is the father of the modern Irish novel." The status of McGahern as...
John McGahern's fiction continually tempts critics to compare him with other novelists. An Irishman, he has undergone the inevitable comparison with Joyce, which few Irish novelists escape. One critic claims, however, that he writes in the tradition of...
Almost forty years on since his debut novel appeared, John McGahern has once again taken the Irish literary scene by storm, delivering a masterpiece with his latest novel By the Lake (published in Ireland as That They May Face The Rising Sun), his first...
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Irish University Review: a journal of Irish Studies
1. Works By McGahern Since McGahern is so popular in France, as is evident from the large body of criticism on his work produced by French academics, written in English as well as in French (see 4 below), and, more importantly, since he...
Nightlines, the title of John McGahern's first collection of stories, (1970), promises a series of sombre narratives; Getting Through, the title of his second, (1978), connects communication with strategies of survival; High Ground, (1986), his most recent collection, hints at elevations of theme or perspective, but a perusal of the title-story reveals the ironies of eminence. John McGahern's short fictions are studies in disillusionment and its apathetic after-math, in alienated authenticity...
