Siobhan Kilfeather

The editors of the Field Day Anthology make large claims for its importance as ‘the most comprehensive anthology of Irish writing ever published’. These three volumes, totalling over four thousand pages and spanning a historical period of fifteen hundred years, bring into print an impressive range and variety of writings from a number of languages, periods and genres, and their publication is a major event in Irish studies. As with previous Field Day events, this one is designed as a significant intervention in Irish culture and politics (if it is possible – Field Day think it isn’t – to distinguish between the two categories): indeed, this anthology has for some years past been heralded as the major Field Day intervention.’