The 111 Greatest Works of Irish Literature

It's to the credit of Castle Rackrent that it's usually taken to be a novel. By its meagre word count, the text constitutes a novella and—shorn of introduction, footnotes and glossary—barely that. But Maria Edgeworth's.... Critique • Quotes • Text • Buy

Everyone knows the central conceit of The Picture of Dorian Gray: a beautiful young man remains unblemished by age, while his painted portrait, hidden from public sight, grows older and corrupted by moral degradation.... Critique • Quotes • At the movies • Buy

The first part of Dracula, when Britisher Jonathan Harker travels to Transylvania to inform his firm's mysterious client about its purchase of real estate in London on his behalf, has got to be some of the most entrancing.... Critique • Quotes • Text • At the movies • Buy

Dubliners is a wonderful collection of stories you can go back to at different times in your life and appreciate on different levels each time. They were written and published before James Joyce got sidetracked by his.... Critique • Quotes • At the movies • Buy

I love the way this novel starts. If you're doing a biographical story, why not start at the very beginning with the perceptions of an infant? Well, baby tuckoo grows up quickly in A Portrait of the Artist as a Young Man and becomes.... Critique • Quotes • Buy

I've read Ulysses five times. It's not that I love it so much. It may be because I've heard so often this is the greatest novel of the twentieth century. Or perhaps because it's so difficult, I figured I had to keep reading it until I got it.... Critique • Quotes • At the movies • Buy

"Science split the atom and Joyce split the word." This summary of progress in the first half of the twentieth century has often been stated in reference to Finnegans Wake. James Joyce chops up words and fuses syllables.... Critique • Quotes • Buy