THE WAKING OF WILLIE RYAN

Publishing in conjunction with the John Broderick Bequest, and the Arts Council of Ireland, to mark 100 years of John Broderick.

Willie Ryan returns to his home town in 'the great central plain of Ireland', having escaped from the insane asylum where he was committed, and unvisited, by his devout Catholic family for twenty-five years. The given pretext for his commitment was an attack on his sister-in-law, Mary Ryan, wife of his brother Michael. The true reason: an affair with a hedonistic young man who introduced him to art, literature and music.

In this exposee; of the 'petty bourgeois snobbishness, hypocrisies and pretensions of the 'little grocer's republic' of 1950s Ireland, nothing evil happens as long as it is not seen. Through Willie's piercing vision, we see the truth of his brother Michael's grief and remorse, his nephew Chris's fear of freedom, and the perceptiveness of asylum nurse Halloran. As Willie prepares for death, he agrees to a private family mass, setting the stage for a confrontation with father Mannix, one of those complicit in putting him away.

The novelist John Broderick was born in Connaught Street, Athlone in 1924. Among his 12 published novels, his best known is The Pilgrimage (1961). His bestseller, An Apology for Roses (1973), sold 30,000 copies in the first week of its publication in 1973.