SOURCE: "Varieties of Disenchantment: Narrative Technique in John McGahern's Short Stories," in Journal of the Short Story in English, No. 13, Autumn, 1989, pp. 77-89.
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 and the sad stoicism of the undeceived.
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