KEANE, John B. The Contractors (Signed by the Author)

Cork: The Mercier Press, 1993. First edition, hardback issue. Octavo. pp. 319. Fine copy in original black cloth, titled in gilt on spine, in fine illustrated dust jacket. Signed by the author on the front free endpaper.

A late novel by the celebrated Kerry playwright and novelist John B. Keane (1928–2002), whose acute observation of rural Irish life made him one of the most widely read and performed Irish writers of the twentieth century. Set against the changing social and economic landscape of modern Ireland, The Contractors explores ambition, loyalty, friendship and opportunism through a cast of vividly drawn characters whose fortunes rise and fall with the fortunes of the building trade. As with Keane’s best fiction, the novel combines humour, sharp dialogue and an intimate knowledge of provincial life.

Although best remembered for dramatic works such as The Field, Sive, Big Maggie and Sharon’s Grave, Keane was also a prolific novelist whose fiction frequently examined the tensions between tradition and modernity in rural Ireland. The Contractors belongs to his later period and demonstrates the same gift for storytelling and characterisation that made his plays enduring favourites on the Irish stage.

An attractive signed copy of a comparatively uncommon Mercier Press hardback. Signed books by Keane remain increasingly sought after, particularly following the author’s death in 2002 and the continuing popularity of his plays and novels. Fine signed copies in dust jacket are becoming difficult to locate.

[L3 8D]