SOURCE: "Strong Women, Dreamy Men," in The New York Times Book Review, February 8, 1987, p. 9.

Conarroe is an American critic and educator. In the following favorable review of High Ground, he compares McGahern's short stories to the work of several highly accomplished modern authors.

John McGahern, the author of such highly regarded novels as The Pornographer and The Leavetaking, has been called an Irish Chekhov, and one does find in his understated prose a fusion of high seriousness and low comedy, of heartbreak and heartburn, reminiscent of the Russian master. Other writers are brought to mind too by his fine new book, High Ground, a collection of stories. When his characters engage in hostile wordplay, the potential violence barely held in check, they sound like Pinter people. The dreamy men and practical women are cousins to Sean O'Casey's strong Junos and inept paycocks. Many of the characters, moreover, paralyzed...