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PREFACE THIS IS AN exciting book, an exciting publishing project. Indeed, it might be called a publisher's dream. For many years, including those ot the great period ot the Abbey Theatre, Joseph Holloway kept a diary in which he recorded not only his reactions to the plays but also his descriptions of Dublin's leading figures: W. B. Yeats, Sean O'Casey, and hundreds of other compelling personalities who cross and recross Holloway'S pages. He wrote at alI this with a consistency and thoroughness which might be called a kind ot magic pedantry. For he has lett us a treasure-house of comment and fact. This diary has had an underground reputation, and for years scholars have consulted the manuscript in the National Library ot Ireland. And now an important series of selections from it has been culled by Robert Hogan and Michael J. O'Neill, whose names have an appropriate Irish tang. Mr. Hogan, who teaches at the University of California at Davis, is no stranger to Southern Illinois UniversityPress; hehas writtenThe Independence of Elmer Rice, which is not only an interesting critical study but also a valuable collection of previously unpublished documents . Mr. Hogan has, in addition, written a book on Sean O'Casey and has helped edit an anthology of plays. Similarly, Mr. O'Neill is no stranger to Southern I11inois University Press, for which he edited one of the James Joyee miscellanies, in coIIaboration with Marvin Mag- vi PREFACE aIaner. Mr. O'Neill, who was born in Dublin, teaches at the University or Ottawa. In putting the present volume together, these editors have had to be highly selective since the manuscript of the diary runs to some .25 million words jotted down hastily on more than 100,000 pages. That it will ever be published in its entirety is doubtful; hence the present redaction has a special value. Holloway was not a perfect commentator; the editors deal with him fairly critically in their introduction, and they even quote some rather uncomplimentary remarks about him. On the other hand, they appreciate his good points, which tlley discuss at length. They have, in presenting the heart of the diary, performed a great service to modern literature. And they have enough excel1ent material of the same kind left over to make another volume the size of the present one, if it is well receivedas it certainly should be. Mr. Hogan and Mr. O'Neill in their introduction provide a lively sketch of Joseph Hol1oway himself, so I will say nothing further about him. It is now time for the reader to tum to that introduction. Afterward he can get into the journal itself and walk the grey streets of Dublin with Hol1oway-a rewarding journey-can sit with him through Abbey performances of alI kinds, and can then accompany him through all the backstage intimacies and intrigues. As I said before, this is an exciting book. Southern Illinois University November 24, 1966 BARRY T. MOORE ...

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