Short Stories, Irish literature, Classics, Modern Fiction, Contemporary Literary Fiction, The Japanese Novel, Post Colonial Asian Fiction, The Legacy of the Austro-Hungarian Empire and quality Historical Novels are Among my Interests








Wednesday, February 29, 2012

Fairy and Folk Tales of The Irish Peasantry by William Butler Yeats-March 23 to March 29-

March 23 to March 29
Fairy and Folk Tales of the Irish Peasants
The Best of Stories as Selected by
William Butler Yeats


Please consider joining us for Irish Short Story Week Year Two, March 12 to March 22.   All you need do is post on one short story by an Irish author and send me a comment on and e mail and I will include it in the master post at the end of the challenge.  



Irish Short Story Week Year Two is scheduled for March 12 to March 22.  I have begun to write my posts for this period and I an finding such a richness of material that I have decided to add on a kind of bonus week focused on short stories that deal directly with the folk and fairy tales of old Ireland.   This decision was prompted by my reading of some of the works in Fairy and Folk Tales of the Irish Peasants by William Butler Yeats.   There are stories about changelings, ghosts, witches, giants, the devil, legendary Kings and Queens from the very old days, and lots of fairy stories.   There is also, of course, a wonderful story about a leprechaun that makes shoes for fairies.   There are stories by William Carleton, Oscar Wilde's mother, and lots  of  authors I have never heard of but whom Yeats says are great writers.   I will be posting on a story or two a day from this collection.   You can download it as I did from Manybooks.

I hope you will join us.  All you have to do if you want to participate is to do a post on a Short Story by an Irish  author and either leave me a comment with a link to it or send me the post data by e mail.  I will announce the posts and will also do, as I did last year, a master post spotlighting the participating blogs.   Last year posts were done by book bloggers from all over the world on a total of sixty short stories.

My Schedule for Irish Short Story Week-Year Two

This is my tentative schedule (there is no suggestion at all that anyone else needs to follow this.  Post on whatever you want, please.)

Day 1.   The Irish Diaspora-Stories by George Moore, Liam O'Flattery, and James Joyce

Day 2.  Oscar Wilde Day-don't be surprise if his mother stops by!

Day 3.  The Irish Roots of the Gothic/Paranormal Story-Lord Dunsany and Joseph Sheridan Le Fanu

Day 4.  Historic Old Stories-Maria Edgeworth, Edith Somerville with Martin Ross,  and William Carleton

Day 5.  Elizabeth Bowen Day (she and Lord Dunsany will be hosting anyone who needs a place to stay)

Day 6.  The 21th Century-

Day 7 -a great romance story by Sean O'Faolain and one by is daughter Julia

Day 8. Stories about priests by William Trevor and Daniel Corkery

Day 9.  Australian Irish Women Day  Stories-in honor of my great Australian Readers-anybody  with an Irish Grandparent counts

Day 10.    open

If  you have any suggestions or questions related to Irish Story Story Week Year Two please let feel free to leave what ever comments you wish, including suggestions for refreshments and snacks.

Mel u



4 comments:

Nancy said...

What a coincidence! Last night, I was checking foreign fairy tales as well. This time, though, I was reading a couple of legends of the Scots, after seeing the beautiful trailer of Disney's upcoming "Brave".

Mel u said...

Nancy-there are lots of great stories -the Filipino short story has been indirectly effected by Irish Folk tales

Órfhlaith Foyle said...

This looks great, Mel u.

@parridhlantern said...

some great ideas here & as usual I admire your ambition & energy, as stated before will do my utmost to add to your gargantuan haul of Irish Literature.