SOURCE: "Big News from Small Worlds," in The New York Review of Books, Vol. XL, No. 7, April 8, 1993, pp. 22-4.

Banville is an Irish novelist and critic. Below, he discusses the defining characteristics of McGahern's short fiction.

As they were controversial, they won him a sort of fame: some thought they were serious, well made, and compulsive . . . bringing things to light that were in bad need of light; but others maintained that they were humourless, morbid, and restricted to a narrow view that was more revealing of private obsessions than any truths about life or Irish life in general.

Thus is described the work of the documentary film maker who is the central character of one of John McGahern's stories: it is also, whether consciously or unconsciously on the author's part, an accurate account of popular and critical attitudes toward McGahern's own work. Throughout his career, beginning thirty years...