Brennan's Book HB

Out Of Print... A brawling novel of the bawdiest Irish playwright ever to lift a glass. Author's first novel. An exuberant novel of the mad cap Irish poet, his boozy haunts and his bawdy,artistic friends. The poet is Eamon O'Connor, drinking his way through the pubs and drawing rooms of his native Dublin with a delightful disregard for society's conventions. Brennan's Book captures all the flair and love and laughter of Irish life, as only Dubliners know it, and will prove a delight to anyone interested in literature, in Ireland, or simply in a superbly told story of one author's whirlwind career. Garrett Anderson's novel of Irish life and literature takes us into the very heart of literary life in Dublin in the 1950s. It is the story of the sudden, meteoric rise to fame of playwright Eamonn O'Connor and of the role played in his dramatic change of circumstances by one Max Brennan, ruthless entrepreneur and aspiring American literary scholar. The narrator of this tale, Patrick Concannon, son of an Irish peer, observes the ruthless exploitation of his drunken but amiable friend whom he is to lose to the wiles of Brennan, at the very same time as the object of his deepest affections, the young and beautiful actress Lavinia Bourke, is irretrievably drawn into the orbit of the charismatic O'connor. Brennan's Book vividly recaptures life in literary Dublin of the time in the bars, the drawing rooms, theaters and streets of a city with more than its fair share of colorful writers and playwrights. The rollicking roistering life of the bars contrasts with the overlay of tragedy which haunts the life of Eamonri O'Connor: a man who is a sad representative of that breed of creative artist possessed of an over-large and genial personality. This is to have a tragically destructive effect on his life and talents' a decline exacerbated by Brennan's uncaring but cunning exploitation which leads to commercial success, on the one hand, and misery and personal failure on the other. Even the attentions of the beautiful and talented Lavinia fail to divert Eamonn from a vicious, self-destructive spiral which leads inexorably to ultimate tragedy. Garrett Anderson here explores a theme which may well seem familiar the trauma and dilemma of the creative artist whose personality tends to obscure his talent. There have been, and still are, many Eamonn O'Connors who have both intrigued and outraged those around them. This is a book for those absorbed by the problems of the creative artist, for those who love literature generally, and for those fascinated by Irish literary life.