Literary Criticism

Kafka first made the acquaintance of Milena Jesenska in 1920 when she was translating his early short prose into Czech, and their relationship quickly developed into a deep attachment. Such...

Every now and again I need to get down here, to get into the Diogenes tub, as it were, or the Colmcille beehive hut, or the Mossbawn scullery. At any...

Brendan Behan wrote over one hundred articles for Irish newspapers between 1951 and 1956 as he rose to international fame, with most of them written in a weekly column in...

Vol 10 of Winter Papers, Ireland’s annual anthology for the arts, is published by Curlew Editions. It offers fiction, non-fiction, poetry, photography, visual arts, along with craft interviews and in-conversation...

THE SUNDAY TIMES BESTSELLER'An intoxicating mixture of poetry and prose, Slug is a taboo-busting delight' SCOTSMAN 'One of the best poets we have' MATT HAIG 'She writes with honesty, conviction,...

'Pain is inevitable, suffering is optional'A compelling mediation on the power of running and a fascinating insight into the life of this internationally bestselling writer. A perfect reading companion for...

A charmingly idiosyncratic look at writing, creativity, and the author's own novels.Haruki Murakami's myriad fans will be delighted by this unique look into the mind of a master storyteller. In...

*THE TOP 10 SUNDAY TIMES BESTSELLER*'This book might just change your life' Sunday Times'Wise, wonderful, moving and brilliant... will leave your heart in a much better place' StylistAfter years of...

Francis Bacon was one of the iconic figures of modern art, a painter who transformed the way we see and experience the human body. Mirroring Bacon's famous triptychs, Jonathan Littell's...

'Inspiring' - Cathy Rentzenbrink, author of Write It All Down'Fascinating and useful' - Joe Moran, author of First You Write A SentenceBestselling and award-winning authors share the secrets to their...

The words of its writers are part of the texture of Dublin, an invisible counterpart to the bricks and pavement we see around us. Beyond the ever-present footsteps of James...

Bird by Bird is the bible of writing guides - a wry, honest, down-to-earth book that has never stopped selling since it was first published in the United States in...

Considered by many to be the iconic French memoirist's defining work, The Years is a narrative of the period 1941 to 2006 told through the lens of memory, impressions past...

'This is the Pandora's Box of self-help books.' - Conan O'BrienOne of this generation's hottest and boldest young comedians, Daniel Sloss presents a transgressive and hilarious analysis of all of...

In Suppose a Sentence, Brian Dillon turns his attention to the oblique and complex pleasures of the sentence. A series of essays prompted by a single sentence - from Shakespeare...

Winner of the 2016 EDGAR, AGATHA, MACAVITY and H.R.F.KEATING crime writing awards, this real-life detective story investigates how Agatha Christie and colleagues in a mysterious literary club transformed crime fiction....

THE EXTRAORDINARY #1 BESTSELLER 'Fiercely feminist, fascinating. I have recommended this to several people. And I'm doing the same here' Sunday Times 'Do not read this book in public: it...

A deeply moving and mind-expanding collection of personal essays in the first ever work of non-fiction from #1 internationally bestselling author John GreenThe Anthropocene is the current geological age, in...

A landmark, incendiary collection from one of the leading essayists working today.Inspiring everyone from radical activists to Beyonce Knowles, Rebecca Solnit's essay 'Men Explain Things to Me' has become a...

A provocative and absorbing analysis of the unprecedented eruption of misogyny at the turn of the century in the works of the key artists of the age. Illustrated throughout.

Colm Toibin's personal account of encountering James Baldwin's work, published in Baldwin's centenary year. Acclaimed Irish novelist Colm Toibin first read James Baldwin just after turning eighteen. He had completed...

'Gay has an ability to blend the personal and political in a way that feels simultaneously gentle and brutal . . . you look at a cultural moment through Gay's...

In the modern information age, our brain's coping mechanisms have been overloaded, and our irrationality turned up to eleven. Amanda Montell blends cultural criticism and personal narrative to explore our...

'This marvel of a book is a profound meditation on the precariousness of the planet ... these pieces kept bringing tears to my eyes, catching me offguard ... it is...

In these delightful, melancholy prose sketches Maeve Brennan goes in pursuit of the ordinary, taking us on a tour of the cheap hotels, unassuming restaurants, and crowded streets of New...

From the acclaimed author of The Most Dangerous Book, the incredible true story behind the creation of a masterpiece of world literature, Fyodor Dostoevsky's Crime and PunishmentIn the summer of...

A TRUE STORY THAT HAS TOUCHED THE HEARTS OF THOUSANDS'Unmitigated delight from cover to cover' DAILY TELEGRAPH 'A real-life love story . . . A timeless period piece. Do read...

'Truly wonderful... Anna Funder has written another brilliant human portrait.' - Claire Tomalin A BLAZING, GENRE-BENDING MASTERPIECE FROM ONE OF THE MOST INVENTIVE WRITERS OF OUR TIMELooking for wonder and...

Kerryman Con Houlihan, who in his time has been a fisherman, a turf cutter and a rugby player, is now best known as one of Ireland's finest journalists. 'In So...

'Much reading is like much eating, wholly useless without digestion' - R. South'If I had read as much as other men, I should have been as ignorant as they' -...

A selection of Robert Fisk's finest 'Comment' pieces from the Saturday 'Independent'. Robert Fisk has amassed a devoted readership over the years, with his insightful, witty and always outspoken articles...

A great American writer's confrontation with a great European critic - a personal and intellectual awakening. Karl Kraus: satirist. Controversialist. Forgotten voice of the early twentieth century. Jonathan Franzen: bestseller....

A NEW YORK TIMES BESTSELLERAs Heard on NPR's This American Life'The delights he extols here (music, laughter, generosity, poetry, lots of nature) are bulwarks against casual cruelties . . ....

The bestselling international classic on storytelling and visual communication "You must read this book." - Neil Gaiman Praised throughout the cartoon industry by such luminaries as Art Spiegelman, Matt Groening,...

Set in and around the city of Veracruz in Mexico, This Is Not Miami delivers a series of devastating stories - spiralling from real events - that bleed together reportage...

While Frank O'Connor was known primarily as one of Ireland's finest short-story writers, he was also an accomplished translator. In the long line of Irish writers given to translating poems...

From 'Best of the Booker' winner Salman Rushdie, an incisive and inspiring collection of non-fiction essays, criticism and speeches that takes readers on a thrilling journey through the evolution of...

Ulysses is one of the foundational texts of modern literature, yet has a reputation for complexity and controversy. In Ulysses Unbound, Joyce expert Terence Killeen untangles this seemingly knotty classic...

What do we mean when we claim affinity with an object or picture, or say affinities exist between such things?Affinities is a critical and personal study of a sensation that...

Annie Ernaux's father died exactly two months after she passed her exams for a teaching certificate. Barely educated and valued since childhood strictly for his labour, Ernaux's father had grown...

A Guest at the Feast uncovers the places where politics and poetics meet, where life and fiction overlap, where one can be inside writing and also outside of it.From the...