An Beal Bocht / The Poor Mouth

IN IRISH. This extremely funny book, with its rain-sodden peasants of Corca Dorcha who combine pretensions to proficiency in English with true caint in the hope of impressing the insatiable Irish-language enthusiasts, was the proof that the Irish of the Revival had come of age. It earned Flann O'Brien the accolade bestowed upon him by Austin Clarke: 'our Gaelic satirist' and is still a useful corrective against the native tendency to take things too seriously.