At Swim-Two-Birds
A Novel
Published on 12. November 2019
224 pages
978-1-5040-5965-7 (ISBN)
Description
An indolent college student creates a chaotic fictional world in this classic of Irish literature: "A marvel of imagination, language, and humor" (
New Republic).
In this comic masterpiece, our unnamed narrator-a student at University College, Dublin, who spends more time drinking and working on his novel than attending classes-creates a character, a pub owner named Trellis, who himself is devoted mainly to writing and sleeping. Soon Trellis is collaborating with an author of cowboy romances, and from there unspools a brilliantly unpredictable adventure that James Joyce himself called "a really funny book."
"'Tis the odd joke of modern Irish literature-of the three novelists in its holy trinity, James Joyce, Samuel Beckett and Flann O'Brien, the easiest and most accessible of the lot is O'Brien. ... Flann O'Brien was too much his own man, Ireland's man, to speak in any but his own tongue." - The Washington Post
"As with Scott Fitzgerald, there is a brilliant ease in [O'Brien's] prose, a poignant grace glimmering off every page." -John Updike
"One of the best books of our century." -Graham Greene
In this comic masterpiece, our unnamed narrator-a student at University College, Dublin, who spends more time drinking and working on his novel than attending classes-creates a character, a pub owner named Trellis, who himself is devoted mainly to writing and sleeping. Soon Trellis is collaborating with an author of cowboy romances, and from there unspools a brilliantly unpredictable adventure that James Joyce himself called "a really funny book."
"'Tis the odd joke of modern Irish literature-of the three novelists in its holy trinity, James Joyce, Samuel Beckett and Flann O'Brien, the easiest and most accessible of the lot is O'Brien. ... Flann O'Brien was too much his own man, Ireland's man, to speak in any but his own tongue." - The Washington Post
"As with Scott Fitzgerald, there is a brilliant ease in [O'Brien's] prose, a poignant grace glimmering off every page." -John Updike
"One of the best books of our century." -Graham Greene
More details
Person
Flann O'Brien is a pseudonym for Brian O'Nolan (1911-1966), an Irish novelist, playwright, and satirist. Born in Strabane, County Tyrone, he is regarded as a key figure in postmodern literature. His English language novels, such as
At Swim-Two-Birds and
The Third Policeman, were written under the pen name Flann O'Brien. His many satirical columns in the
Irish Times and an Irish language novel
An Béal Bochtwere written under the name Myles na gCopaleen. O'Nolan's novels have attracted a wide following for their bizarre humor and modernist metafiction.
Content
- Intro
- Title
- Chapter 1
- Copyright
