Readership: Scholars and students of twentieth-century Irish Literature.
Neil Corcoran, King Alfred Professor of English at the University of Liverpool
Review(s) from previous edition"The breadth and complexity of Professor Corcoran's terms of reference, which also include, most notably, T. S. Eliot and Sigmund Freud, mark this out as a scholarly work aimed primarily at postgraduates and other academics. But this defines rather than limits his achievement, which is to renovate an important landmark in the occasionally barren territory of mid-twentieth century literature. - Contemporary Review
"Corcoran's investigation of largely unplumbed sources, such as Bowen's wartime bulletins to Churchill from Ireland and the diary of her lover Charles Ritchie, are pertinent and illuminating.. . .Most impresively... Corcoran's use of language is sensuous, nuanced and precise enough to stand comparison with Bowen's own scrupulous verbal intensity" - Lucy Carlyle, Times Literary Supplement
"Insightful. [Corcoran] is eloquent throughout on two of the strongest strains in Bowens work: her hauntedness, and what he calls the gift or pain or dislocation of living between Ireland and England." - New York Times Book Review
Introduction 1. Ireland 1.: The Ghost in the House: 'Bowen's Court' (1942) and 'The Back Drawing-Room' (1926) 2.: Discovery of a Lack: 'The Last September' (1928) 3.: A Gost of Style: 'A World of Love' (1955) 2. Children 1.: Mother and Child: 'The House in Paris' (1935) 2.: Motherless Child: 'The Death of the Heart' (1938) 3.: Childless Mother: The Disfigurations of 'Eve Trout or Changing Scenes' 3. War 1.: Words in the Dark: 'The Demon Lover and Other Stories' 2.: War's Stories: 'The Heat of the Day' (1946) and its Contexts
