The Gaelic hero Fionn mac Cumhaill (often known in English as Finn MacCool) has had a long life. First cited in Old Irish chronicles from the early Christian era, he became the central hero of the Fenian Cycle which flourished in the high Middle Ages. Stories about Fionn and his warriors continue to be told by storytellers in Ireland and in Gaelic Scotland to this day. This book traces the development of Fionn's persona in Irish and Scottish texts and constructs a heroic biography of him. As aspects of the hero are borrowed into English and later world literature, his personality undergoes several changes. Seen as less than admirable, he may become either a buffoon or a blackguard. Somehow these contradictions exist side by side. Among the writers in English most interested in Fionn are James Macpherson, the "translator" of The Poems of Ossian ( 17601, William Carleton, the first great fiction writer of nineteenth-century Ireland, and Fiann O'Brien, the multifaceted author of At Swim-Two-Birds. Aspects of Fiann appear as far apart as Mendelssohn's "Hebrides (or Fingal 's Cave) Overture" and a contemporary rock opera. But the most complex use of Fionn's story in modern literature is James Joyce's Finnegans Wake.

Ireland: 198 A.D. Six years have passed since the brutal attack on the community of Ráth Bládhma. The isolated valley of Glenn Ceoch is at peace once more but those who survived still bear the scars of that struggle. Now, new dangers threaten the settlement. The warrior Liath Luachra has discovered troubling signs of strangers in the surrounding wilderness. Disgraced druid Bodhmhall fears a fresh attempt to abduct her talented nephew. A summons from the fortress Dún Baoiscne sets them both on a perilous traverse of the Great Wild where enemies, old and new, await them. And Muirne has returned to reclaim her son. Come what may, there will be blood. Based on the ancient Fenian Cycle texts, the Fionn mac Cumhaill Series recounts the fascinating and pulse-pounding tale of the birth and adventures of Ireland’s greatest hero, Fionn mac Cumhaill.

The stories of Finn MacCoull and his warriors were once told at every fireside in Scotland and Ireland. After centuries in obscurity, this collection brings the tales soaring to life again. Here you will find Diarmuid, whom no woman can help but fall in love with, and Ossian, a warrior-poet raised in the woods by a wild deer. There is Grainne, ancient ancestor of Iseult and Guinevere, and Finn himself, whose name was once a byword for wisdom, generosity and beauty. Enter a world of feasting and fighting, battles and poetry, riddles and omens; join Finn and the Fianna on their never-ending quest to drink deeper and deeper of the cup of life.

A lyrical celebration of storytelling, of childhood, and of the transformative power of music. Tracing a circular course that echoes Bach’s Goldberg Variations , Luis Sagasti’s second book to appear in English takes the guise of a musical scheherazade, recounting story after story, vibrating to celestial harmonies. From the music born of the sun to the music sent into space on the Voyager mission, from Rothko to rock music, from the composers of the concentration camps to a weeping room for Argentinian conscripts in the Falklands, A Musical Offering traverses the shifting sands of fiction and history.

He is Ireland's most famous warrior, a legendary figure who has enchanted children for millennia. But who really was Fionn Mac Cumhaill? And what was he like when he was a child? Find out in this wonderful, modern retelling of an ancient tale, which includes well-known myths like the Salmon of Knowledge and the Dragon of Tara.

He is Ireland's most famous warrior, a legendary figure who has enchanted children for millennia. But who really was Fionn Mac Cumhaill? And what was he like when he was a child? Find out in this wonderful, modern retelling of an ancient tale, which includes well-known myths like the Salmon of Knowledge and the Dragon of Tara.