Patrick McCabe

Ellen McWilliams (University of Exeter)

Ed. by Ian Campbell Ross, Trinity College Dublin
The Literary Encyclopedia. Volume 1.2.4: Irish Writing and Culture, 400-present.
Vol. editors: Paul Delaney (Trinity College Dublin), Anne Markey (Dublin City University), Ian Campbell Ross (Trinity College Dublin), Sinéad Sturgeon (Queen's University Belfast)

Dates

Born 27 Mar 1955
Activity 1992-ongoing

Places

Born in Ireland, Republic of (Eire)
Active in Ireland, Republic of (Eire); United Kingdom

Activities

Primary

Novelist

Resources

McCabe's Works

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Patrick McCabe is one of the most important Irish novelists of his generation. Born in Clones, Co. Monaghan in 1955, he has written eight novels, several plays, screenplays for film and television, and a children's book,

The Adventures of Shay Mouse: The Mouse from Longford

(1985). He has received several prestigious Irish literary awards, and has been twice shortlisted for the Booker prize for his novels

The Butcher Boy

(1992) and

Breakfast on Pluto

(1998). McCabe's fiction explores the history of post-independence Ireland and engages dramatically with Irish politics and society in the mid-to-late twentieth century. All of McCabe's novels have a dark, gothic aspect, and his work is characterized by distinctive black comic elements. His protagonists are, more often than not, outsiders –…

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2338 words

Citation: McWilliams, Ellen. "Patrick McCabe". The Literary Encyclopedia. First published 20 December 2006 [https://www.litencyc.com/php/speople.php?rec=true&UID=5063, accessed 24 April 2024.]

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