SOURCE: Harris, Michael. Review of Amongst Women, by John McGahern. Los Angeles Times Book Review (9 September 1990): 6.

In the following review, Harris considers the cultural differences between American and European readings of Amongst Women.

Michael Moran was once a dashing hero of the Irish War of Independence. Now he is a prickly and embittered old man living “amongst women”—his young second wife and three daughters. He has cut his ties with the past but disdains the present, he has isolated himself and his family, “that larger version of himself,” but dreads the loneliness sure to come when his sons run away and his daughters marry.

John McGahern (The Dark, The Pornographer) writes with ease and economy of an Ireland hardly disturbed by such modern intrusions as cars, chain saws and TV. Grudges and rituals live on—hatred of the Black and Tans, the evening reading of the Rosary...