Flann O'Brien's first novel is a brilliant impressionistic jumble of ideas, mythology and nonsense. Operating on many levels it incorporates plots within plots, giving full rein to O'Brien's dancing intellect and Celtic wit. The undergraduate narrator lives with his uncle in Dublin, drinks too much with his friends and invents stories peopled with hilarious and unlikely characters, one of whom, in a typical O'Brien conundrum, creates a means by which women can give birth to full-grown people. Flann O'Brien's blend of farce, satire and fantasy result in a remarkable, astonishingly innovative book.

Two young orphans, Finbarr and Manus, are taken into the household of the eccentric Mr Collopy where they grew up surrounded by the smells of good whiskey and bad cooking. Manus proves to be a business genius, and this talent takes him from teaching people to walk the tightrope by correspondence course to the Vatican. The greatest satirical Irish writer of the twentieth-century turns his attention to the garrulous Irish and vividly captures the wit, extravagance and glory of their talk.

This riotous collection at last gathers together an expansive selection of Flann O'Brien's shorter fiction in a single volume, as well as O'Brien's last and unfinished novel, Slattery's Sago Saga. Also included are new translations of several stories originally published in Irish, and other rare pieces. With some of these stories appearing here in book form for the very first time, and others previously unavailable for decades, Short Fiction
is a welcome gift for every Flann O'Brien fan worldwide.

Flann O'Brien (Brian O'Nolan, aka Myles na Gopaleen) adopted not only a new name (George Knowall) for these rarely seen pieces, but also a new persona. Writing his column 'Bones of Contention' for the Nationalist and Leinster Times, he took on the character of the quizzical and enquiring humorist who might be found in a respectable public house in Carlow: erudite, urbane and informative, he is the country cousin of the Myles of Dublin, yet still a facet of the complex character who wrote The Third Policeman and At Swim-Two-Birds. His delight in words, his uncanny ability to see through humbug, are unparalleled. Writers as disparate as James Joyce, Dylan Thomas, Graham Greene and Anthony Burgess have marvelled at his talent. New readers will discover that he is one of the funniest writers in any language, at any time. Brian O'Nolan, who also wrote under the pen names of Flann O'Brien and Myles na Gopaleen, was born in 1911 in Co Tyrone. A resident of Dublin, he graduated from...