By turns sacred or profane, mystical or earthy, scathingly satirical and modern or achingly nostalgic for the ever-receding past, the literature of Ireland has long entranced and entertained readers the world over. Now The Oxford Companion to Irish Literature provides a comprehensive and delightfully readable guide to the evolution and achievements of Irish writers and writing across sixteen tumultuous centuries, from fourth-century ogam writing etched on ancient stones, to the towering twentieth-century figures of Yeats, Joyce, and Beckett, to the bold new voices emerging today as Ireland...