Mary Lavin Critical Essay | Critical Essay by Richard Burnham

Critical Essay by Richard Burnham

SOURCE: Burnham, Richard. “Mary Lavin's Short Stories in The Dublin Magazine.” Cahiers du Centre d'Etudes Irlandaises 2 (1977): 103-10.

In the following essay, Burnham examines Lavin's stories published in The Dublin Magazine, including “Miss Holland,” “A Fable,” “Brigid,” and “An Akoulins of the Irish Midlands,” and discusses her relationship with editor Seumus O'Sullivan.

Mary Lavin is among the most talented of Irish short story writers to appear in this century. As early as April 1939, when Mary Lavin was only twenty-seven years old, she published her first story, “Miss Holland,” in The Dublin Magazine. Seumas O'Sullivan, the editor of The Dublin Magazine, called it “a finished piece of work” and said that”its delicate restraint appealed greatly …” O'Sullivan, who was keen to encourage talented young Irish writers and provide them with a literary journal in which to publish their work, told Mary Lavin that he would be glad to consider...
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