Toome’ author’s new book

Toomevara author Brendan Lynch has completed what he says will probably be his last book. Dublin’s Graftonia: A Very Literary Neighbourhood is the final of his four books on Dublin’s rich literary history.

He explains: “Grafton Street with its €5,000 handbags is probably the last place one would associate with struggling writers and poets. Yet it was on this street that Oscar Wilde and WB Yeats first saw themselves in print in the street’s many nineteenth century magazines.

“And it was a chance meeting between Yeats and Tipperary man John O’Leary at 116 Grafton Street which kickstarted the Irish Literary Revival. James Joyce was first published on nearby Stephen’s Green, while other writers associated with the area include Jonathan Swift, Bram Stoker, Samuel Beckett, poets Thomas Moore and Patrick Kavanagh, and the irrepressible Brendan Behan.

“Distinguished visitors included Walter Scott, whose carriage was pulled through the streets of Dublin by admirers. Also revolutionary poet Percy Bysshe Shelley, novelist Anthony Trollope, who set all his early books in Ireland, and Charles Dickens, who visited Dublin three times in the mid-1800s.”

Endorsed by Joycean scholar David Norris, Dublin’s Graftonia is expected to be launched in Dublin in October. Foreword writer, author Lissa Oliver insisted: “Brendan Lynch’s writing is so fresh and engaging, so of the moment, with humour, wonderful stories and, of course, educational nuggets snuck in so that reluctant scholars are still learning while being entertained. It is a wonderful celebration of generations of world-famous writers and poets.”