About the Author

Rights: World (English language only)
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Famine
Liam O'Flaherty

“O’Flaherty is the most heroic of Irish novelists, the one who has always tackled big themes, and in one case, in this great novel, succeeded in writing something imperishable … Mary Kilmartin (the heroine) has been singled out by two generations of critics as one of the great creations of modern literature. And so she is.”
- The Irish Times

‘The author’s skill as a storyteller is at times breathtaking. This is a most rewarding novel.’
- Publishers Weekly

‘The sun’s rays now came slantwise through a gap between two high peaks on the west, gilding the sombre Valley with a gorgeous light. The vast shadows on the mountains made a ghostly pattern of extraordinary beauty. Now the dim colours of the gorse, the heather and the decaying green of the potato stalks were brought forth… Down below, the roaring torrent cascaded from the Black Lake through narrow, rocky gorges, until it widened below the house to a deep pool that was now yellow and turbulent with a press of water, its banks fringed with a swirling rime of froth and jetsam gathered by the flood.’

65 years since its initial publication, Liam O’Flaherty’s Famine is a work of remarkable beauty and power which has stood the test of time. With its reissue, Wolfhound Press is honouring this great Irish writer and introducing his work to a new generation of readers. Over the next few years it will reprint, in beautiful new formats, previously published O’Flaherty titles. Wolfhound Press also intends to publish some of his older novels that have been out of print for some time.

Famine tells the story of three generations of the Kilmartin family as they fight to survive the Great Famine. It is a story full of human tragedy, courage and passion.

O’Flaherty was born on the Aran Islands in 1896 and died aged 88 in Dublin having lived a full and fruitful life. Apart from their intrinsic literary value, his books are a crucial sociological study, charting the ways and beliefs of a peasant world before they were lost forever.