John McGahern was hailed by Hilary Mantel as “one of the greatest writers of our era” and the Irish Times described him as “a natural historian of the soul”. His masterpiece, Amongst Women, was shortlisted for the Man Booker Prize in 1990 and won the highly coveted Irish Times/Aerlingus Award. His writing features in University courses in Ireland of course, but interestingly, they can be found in University course in France. His works have been adapted for the stage, the radio, cinema, and the silver screen. Yet despite all this, he is seldom mentioned beyond the halls of academia or by writers themselves. This is puzzling since his writing tends to focus on the everyday, the fundamental, through writing that is crisp, succinct, and profound. The messages in his work are always subtle and never forced, perhaps his obscurity is a result of the nature of his writing; subtle, independent, and as far from the current climate of flippant scandal as could be possible.
Through this podcast I hope my guests and I will help to spark renewed interest in John McGahern among the wider public in a manner in harmony with McGahern’s nature.
Host: Ronan Mullin
Guests: John McHugh, Joe Bohan, Brian Ishmael, and Ryan Lally
Producer: Ronan Mullin
Jan. 2017. Copyright
