O'Flaherty, Liam - O'Flaherty, Liam 1896–
O'Flaherty, Liam 1896–
O'Flaherty is an Irish realistic novelist and short story writer.
For many years O'Flaherty was classified with Joyce and O'Casey as a realist, although this label indicates chiefly a reaction to the writing of Yeats, Synge, and A.E. Yet O'Flaherty's novels still possess a depth and range that deserve reexamination. From the standpoint of literary history, O'Flaherty examines in his novels major shifts in the Irish psyche in the first half of the twentieth century; he describes in detail the effect of social and economic change on the peasant or country man; futhermore, his protagonists fit into significant psychological and existential patterns.
In general, O'Flaherty writes a realistic novel with readily recognized settings and characters, but the theme and plot revolve around a neoromantic protagonist. Although O'Flaherty has naturalistic leanings, he never makes the meticulous examination of environment of a Zola...
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