Donn Byrne[28]
Project Gutenberg EPUB3 edition
Parrington, Vernon Louis
American born but Irish bred. His early work, The Stranger’s Banquet (1919), half problem novel—industrialism—which offered little scope for the Celtic wistfulness in which he conceives romance to lie.
Messer Marco Polo (1921). The romance of distant times and places, of unfamiliar backgrounds and lovely worlds: medieval Venice and its pageantry; a far quest over burning sands; the loveliness of little Golden Bells at the court of Kubla Khan; the ardor of love that tangles itself in religion. A wistfulness and beauty of phrase that remind one of Synge’s Riders to the Sea. The loveliest romance of recent years.[29]
The Wind That Bloweth (1922). A rich fabric—Gaelic folk; the woman of the boulevard; the white sun-baked road to Damascus; the fire of revolution; the crack of cordage as the ship rounds the Horn—a saga of the unquiet heart.
The Changeling (1923). Short stories of quaint places, forgotten people; the Bible and love of Ireland. Done with excellent craftsmanship.
Blind Raftery (1924). A tale of a blind harpist in Dean Swift’s Ireland and of his wife, Hilaria, who sings the song of the women of the streets in Cadiz. Life teaches them a philosophy expressed by the harpist in these words: “We sit a little while by ourselves in an apart, dark place, and we learn truths, of how certain things one believes to be good are but vulgar selfish things, and how certain things the small think evil are but futile accidents. And we learn to be kind; such wisdom comes when we are dead. And those who have never died in life ... are pleasant shallow people, soulless as seals.”